Posts by SpiderMonkey

7

I believe the WTS has God's spirit

by Leander in

jw
friends

.....although in a very small amount.

in fact i beleive that many religions today have a measure of god's spirit.

the more i take time to really meditate and think about the bible and the world that we live in, it becomes more apparent to me that it would'nt make sense for god to destroy honest people simply because they are not associated with the wts.

SpiderMonkey

(((Leander, Matty)))

Leander, your experience with your mom really seems close to my own... Those conversations, over about 2 or 3 weeks, as she tried to persuade me not to leave "The Truth", were very difficult... My sister called me, in tears, asking "Don't you know you're committing suicide?" (My brother was always a bit of an emotionless, self-involved prick, and so only wrote me a goodbye letter & spoke to me only once at a funeral a couple years ago ;) And over the years, as my mom saw that her sporadic tries at convincing me to come back weren't having any effect, they really have all begun to shun me (leaving a family get-together if I was there, & so on).

I won't pretend that I think the WTS has *any* of God's spirit, or that the majority of religions in the world do, or even that there's One God out there... I did learn some excellent lessons from the witnesses, having been raised that way through my teen years, and I have committed some "sins" as they & others would have it, but I do appreciate the reasons for caution that they taught me... Basically, I say as Pellonius did: To thine own self be true. Because that, I think, is where one finds the divine: Deep inside, rather than in any book passed down over generations... I guess my point is that I feel the witnesses gave me a good foundation for an intelligent life, and that other religions do so as well, despite their reasons for doing so!

SpiderMonkey

16

Letter Read at service meeting

by scary_goat2000 in

jw
friends

letter was read at the meeting tonight during the service meeting.

probably because of the dateline thing.. several points brought out, cant remember them all:.

1) sexual abuse is bad.

SpiderMonkey

LOL Princess!!!

I don't have a TV, so I went to my dad&stepmom's place to watch it... In the course of explaining to my stepmom (never a JW) why I thought it was going to be interesting, I mentioned the 2 witness thing.

She went ballistic, and people all over the U.S. are doing the same =)

SpiderMonkey

3

How did the WT do compared to Catholic Church?

by Perry in

jw
friends

where was the sorrow for the victums?

where was the promise to the sheep that they'll do a better job of shepherding?

where was the repentant attitude?.

SpiderMonkey

good questions, Perry! I think they flunked. Not only did they specifically advise the flock *not* to contact the police, they insisted that if the abuser doesn't admit it, you have to let it go.

Not only that, they actually disfellowshipped those who *did* have the courage to seek legal justice, and had the abused's entire congregation on their side!!! "uggggggh... my brain is clean now... it doesn't need any more washing"

In fact, they didn't even bother to move the abusers to a different area. It seems that once he "repented" (or even if he didn't) it was up to the victim to just forgive him and move on.

Here's hoping that the 2 lawsuits, and future ones, extract AT LEAST as much $$$ apiece as the ones against the Catholics have.

SpiderMonkey

21

Dateline a hit

by Cygnus in

jw
friends

i give it an a-plus.

i am pleasantly surprised.

actually i was more emotional than that.

SpiderMonkey

hmmmm... Can you imagine the reactions of those "uhhhh i don't think i'm going to the bookstudy tonight" witnesses who saw THEIR VERY OWN LOCAL KINGDOM HALLS being pictured on secret cams? Hehehehe... Look for the WTS to become even *more* secretive & shady, methinks, not less.

SpiderMonkey

34

Dateline---That was It?

by Lindy in

jw
friends

well, i am bucking the general consensus here that everything went well on dateline.

i thought it was fine as far as it went but looking at it through the local jw eyes it will not get what you all and i hoped for.

the show didn't put proof on all the cases we all know about.

SpiderMonkey

Thanks, Lindy; I appreciate your kindness :)
and LOL, LB! yes, THAT is the real triumph here; all over the U.S. this week Bible studies are being cancelled, books that were "placed" are being thrown away, witnesses are being told "get off my property" and (mwahaHAha) donations are NOT being given :D

SpiderMonkey

34

Dateline---That was It?

by Lindy in

jw
friends

well, i am bucking the general consensus here that everything went well on dateline.

i thought it was fine as far as it went but looking at it through the local jw eyes it will not get what you all and i hoped for.

the show didn't put proof on all the cases we all know about.

SpiderMonkey

Unfortunately, the flip side is this: Naeblis, I do not think that this org will *ever* change their policy on this or anything else as a result of outsiders' opinions.

I went over to watch the show at my dad's place, along w/ him & my stepmom. My stepmom could not fathom that anyone would go along with the org's insistence on the 2-witness rule if their own daughter had been raped, so my dad (also an xJW, although he only joined it to keep the family together) asked me: If my sister had been raped by another witness, do you think your mother would have gone to the elders, or would she have gone to the police?

I could only respond that she'd go to the elders, and she would do *whatever* they said to do. The "brother" admitted no wrongdoing, and therefore that was that; if there's truth to the accusation Jehovah will deal with it in due time. If that's what they said, she would have let it drop, period. If they'd told her to stick a banana up my sister's left nostril to alleviate the hurt she was feeling, she would have done that.

My point here is this: The WTS mainly attracts large numbers of people who feel like losers for one reason or another, and who want to feel special. If they tell you that X is what you need to do to continue to be special, then you will not do Y, you will not do Z, and you will not do X-1... you will do X. They *also* happen to scoop up lesser numbers of people who are intelligent and reasonable, but who for one reason or another go along with it for awhile. But, when you wise up and decide to DA, or get DF'd, or simply drift away, THEY WILL ALWAYS HAVE ANOTHER SELF-TERMED LOSER TO HOOK WITH THEIR PRETTY TALK. And people who are determined to stay losers will not catch on when the talk suddenly gets ugly; they will take their issue to the elders, listen to the spin, and sigh with relief "oh, I just didn't understand before."

sorry for the seeming defeatism there, but I really have no hope that this org will ever become something remotely positive. My best hope on this is that they will eventually fade away. (and I *still* hope that that Dateline segment will play a not-too-small part in *that* victory)

SpiderMonkey

34

Dateline---That was It?

by Lindy in

jw
friends

well, i am bucking the general consensus here that everything went well on dateline.

i thought it was fine as far as it went but looking at it through the local jw eyes it will not get what you all and i hoped for.

the show didn't put proof on all the cases we all know about.

SpiderMonkey

I agree with most of what's been written here in one way or another, but here's my personal take:

I was a baptized witness from ages 13-23. I pioneered, and spent 3 years at Bethel. And, although well aware of the rule that you must have 2 or 3 witnesses to any wrongdoing, it had NEVER occurred to me, until yesterday when I started reading on this site (7 years after my DFing) that this rule MUST logically create a huge sex abuse problem within the org. It is so obvious now, that I could cry for ignoring it (and other problems)... This is bound to force itself onto some people's radars, including lots of non-witnesses, and at least a few witnesses. So IMO at least their evil work has been dealt a big setback. Our own personal experiences, for many of us, prove that intelligent people who *want* self-esteem will find their own right reason to leave; it probably will not happen as a result of one TV show, true. But the facts presented on Dateline will keep people from seeing the JWs as harmless little fairies, and at the very least open a little crack in the walls these people build against the rest of the world.

SpiderMonkey

7

"East Metairie"/N.O.,LA, USA ex-JW's?

by SpiderMonkey in

welllllll... this is my first post on this forum =) i've enjoyed some of the paranoiac screaming back&forth on the un thread (hehehe, no, i mean really enjoyed it), but what i'd really like to do is contact any ex-jdubs from the east metairie cong in louisiana; i was there during the late 80s / early 90s... especially phoebe, if you're out there; i know it's a long shot!.

peas, spidermonkey

SpiderMonkey

Thanks for the welcome, BG! Yeah, I feel like I've already learned a lot; I logged in here for the first time yesterday around 2 in the afternoon, and was online until about 2 in the MORNING ;) verrrry interesting stuff.

I do remember Frank & Peggy by name, but not by face... Were they in the Spanish cong by chance? East Metairie did share the KH with a Spanish congregation, and I knew a few of them vaguely...

Nice to meet you =) SpiderMonkey

42

From JW to Pagan

by Sirona in

jw
friends

i've noticed that quite a few people on this board have said that they are now pagan.

i'm starting to wonder if converting to paganism is something that many ex-jws do?

being a pagan myself, i am actually surprised at how i could choose the religion that jws probably hate the most.

SpiderMonkey

Whoa! I just joined this forum, & happened to run across a post from a Wiccan ex-Jdub, & did a search on "pagan", & came across this...

Pardon my French, but Mwahaha.

It's interesting to me that a number of folks mentioned ex-Jdubs becoming Pagans in large numbers, because that would seem, at a glance, to indicate we did so as a reaction, or a "stab," back at our roots or last affiliation... In my own case, though, I know that's not true, because I spent a year or so (after leaving) thinking that JW's were right, but I didn't care because it went so far against my grain to believe & live as they did (I was ready to die at Armageddon, as long as I enjoyed the time up until then). Time sort of wore that one away, though; I became more agnostic, believing that any god who might exist must not care one way or another... And then I dated a Wiccan/Witch a few years later - she never tried to "convert" me, but answered all my questions about it, and I found myself thinking back to my childhood... I'd always been fascinated by Greek myths & gods, even well into my JW indoctrination - even in my high school years, as a baptized JW, I was fantasizing about the possibility of having my own gods & goddesses, each having their separate roles over various realms of life, Like the Greek deities, but with faces or aspects that made the most sense to me personally. So as I heard my girlfriend say things like "the earth is our Mother, the sky is our Father," and so on, it rang a bell inside me and I started reading. Even though that relationship only lasted 3 months, and I never told her I was interested in Paganism, well... By the end of 3 months, I knew that I was a Pagan through and through! I doubt I'll ever belong to any organized religion, Pagan or otherwise, but finding my *own* true path to the divine for the past 5 years has been the most enlightening, liberating experience of my life! I'd be very interested to hear from other XJW Pagans about their personal experiences.

peas, SpiderMonkey

7

"East Metairie"/N.O.,LA, USA ex-JW's?

by SpiderMonkey in

welllllll... this is my first post on this forum =) i've enjoyed some of the paranoiac screaming back&forth on the un thread (hehehe, no, i mean really enjoyed it), but what i'd really like to do is contact any ex-jdubs from the east metairie cong in louisiana; i was there during the late 80s / early 90s... especially phoebe, if you're out there; i know it's a long shot!.

peas, spidermonkey

SpiderMonkey

welllllll... this is my first post on this forum =) I've enjoyed some of the paranoiac screaming back&forth on the UN thread (hehehe, no, I mean REALLY enjoyed it), but what I'd really like to do is contact any ex-Jdubs from the East Metairie cong in Louisiana; I was there during the late 80s / early 90s... especially Phoebe, if you're out there; I know it's a long shot!

peas, SpiderMonkey