Nobody joins a cult.
You join a self-help group, a religious movement, a political organization.
They change so gradually, by the time you realize you’re entrapped – and almost everybody does – you can’t figure a safe way back out. – Deborah Layton, survivor of Jim Jones’ Peoples Temple cult
People join a group because we are social animals and want to belong. The vast majority of groups are benign; many are even positive. The trouble is, the majority of ones that are harmful, destructive cults appear to belong to these categories even though they are not. Cult leaders are masters of deception.
- So why did I become a JW?
In my case, I was searching for meaning. Neither of my parents were religious when I was growing up, so they didn't provide me with much in the way of values or ethics. My grandmother, who was a wonderful person, gave me a Bible to read. I liked the wisdom of some of the proverbs and some of Jesus' parables, but other than that most of it frankly seemed like myths.
So I examined a bunch of different religions and found that all of them had some ideas of value, but they also were loaded with a bunch of crap.
Cult Recruiting Tactic #1: I began studying with JWs in my early twenties when two cute young JW women came to the door. Their physical attractiveness got my attention, but I was struck by the fact that they didn't believe in hellfire or the Trinity—two concepts of Christianity that I had come to reject on my own.
Cult Recruiting Tactic #2: Also, the ideas of a world free of injustice, sickness and death appealed to me. I liked that then (and I like it still, although I know now that it's never coming from "Jehovah" or any other made-up "god").
So I agreed to a "Bible Study"with an elder in the congregation. I was very skeptical over the course of the two years I "studied" with him and probably never would have joined, but I had a personal trauma which made me very emotionally vulnerable – Cult Recruiting Tactic #3.
Cult Recruiting Tactic #4: That's when I started attending meetings. The "love-bombing" felt good. By then I was hooked.
Cult Recruiting Tactics #5 – 7: Throughout my time as a JW I had many, many doubts. But the WTBTS (like any good cult) has very effective "Thought Stopping" ways to deal with that:
- Keep studying the Bible (and the WT publications) and you'll understand later, or
- Pray to Jehovah, or
- Doubts are from Satan
Eventually, the evidence was just too overwhelming to my logical mind and sense of justice that this religion was false just like every other one and was in fact of the cult end of the religious spectrum.
By this time, I'd been an elder for over a decade and had a family with children that I was raising in the cult. I tried for six or seven years to find a way to leave with my family intact. It eventually became obvious that my born-in wife would never leave. So I went to "Plan B" and tried to figure out how to leave and maintain a relationship with my two teenage sons.
Unfortunately, I was better at indoctrinating them in the bullshit creeds and beliefs of this destructive religion than I was at forming unbreakable bonds of love with them.
I left the religion eleven years ago, and although I am technically still a JW "in good standing," my two sons continue to shun me simply because I no longer attend meetings at the Kingdom Hall.
I truly, truly hate this fucking religion.
Let's review: It's a cult!