This is like a word-for-word article based on talks I had heard throughout my life growing up as a JW, both at the local and convention levels.
Talk about a mind-f*ck, how are these people supposed to support themselves, and who is going to take care of them - the Governing Body? Ha!! They don't even look after the people they had directly under their wing up at Bethel!!!
What's that saying I once heard about militant dictatorships? Oh, that the first thing they do when they seize control is to imprison or kill the intellectuals, and then to take over the education system. This is because the intellectuals are the greatest threat to their power structure, and by taking over the education system they can then spoon-feed propoganda to the youngest subjects under them. Sound familiar??? The Governing Body could easily be the top leaders of the Nazi or Mao Regimes, with the Writing Department being the propoganda machine.
Also, I notice how this article pushes baptism at a young age as an important decision, but yet fails to mention why such other important decesions such as DATING, voting, drinking, sex, extra-cirrucular activities or damn near anything else a teenager would like to do is considered FORBIDDEN, all under the guise of being in the "bloom of youth". So you're old enough to make a life-long spiritual and financial committment to an ORGANIZTION (remember the WT baptismal vows) but you're not good enough to make other life choices for yourself??? F*CK YOU WT!!!!
I only wish I could have put 2 +2 together and told my parents or Elders that while being pressured from the ages of 10-16!!! I would have loved to have thrown that back at them, but instead I just deflected it as much as I could. I never did get baptized into the "Society" because of this ever-increasing feeling, a sense really, of something just not being right with this religion and also the fact that you could never do enough, be enough, etc and also that you could be DF'd and shunned. To hell with that, I much rather would be looked at as an inactive, unbaptised publisher then a DF'd leper.
Education: I was forbidden from it, even though I had straight A's and graduated from high school in the top 5% of my class. I took my SAT's and such, but could never get to the guidance counsel to even talk about it. It was forbidden at home. This is just sick. I'm glad I finally did get to college though, albeit on my own. The WT would rob you of your youth, education, career, time, money, and family. What exactly do they give back??? NOTHING.
- Wing Commander