Let's tackle this problem with a different tool box than we've been using up till now in this discussion, okay?

Let's talk about values.

TWO KINDS OF LIFE are open to everybody.

1.Learn the way things actually work and master the rules. Educate and apply your knowledge. Excel and improve as a result of your efforts. Plan for the days ahead and lay a foundation for your children and family.

OR...

2.Join a group and BE TOLD you have a purpose, you are valuable and you have a bright hope for the future IF you do as you ARE TOLD.

Step one is hard work and requires intelligence, effort and dilligence.

Step two allows you to remain stupid and survive while THINKING you are way ahead of the smart people!

If people carry around wrong ideas about how the world works they frequently bump into real world conflicts that test their wrong ideas. It is a dash of cold water in the face at the least and a life threatening crises at worst.

It is hard to be stupid and yet survive at a level of daily life that isn't swarming with countless problems.

Ignorant people, for example, have a bad diet that distorts their health and appearance. (Their ideas about what to eat are proven wrong by the outcome of actually eating unhealthy food and suffering the consequencs.)

HERE IS WHERE THE GROUP DYNAMIC comes in to play.

Groups tend to surround vulnerable people with a sense of well-being, a sense of purpose and a strong hope for the future.

(Weight Watchers and Alcoholics Anonymous)

A religious group like Jehovah's Witnesses can be a placebo for losers.

While seeming to provide the means for improving your life, you are smothered by rules and policies that make it UNNECESSARY for you ever to have to THINK and REASON things out on your own.

Almost all religions start out with a delusional genius. Because of their intelligence, charisma and ability to spin, twist and explain--they achieve a following.

C.T.Russell was such a genius. His writings were clearly presented as BETTER at teaching God's plan than the Bible itself. He pulled together various crackpot ideas and hoakum into a semblance of pure teaching.

He pinned the hopes of the group on End Times predictions and kept enthusiasm alive through fear and hope.

He was followed by a brutish lout who was a contrarian--yet--who possessed legal skills and an intelligent grasp of how to pit one group of people against another. Judge Rutherford attracted blue-collar, honest-hearted ignoramuses who learned to thumb their noses at mainstream religion, government and education.

Rutherford couldn't sustain the End Times carrot and stick. So, he changed the religion into contrarian naysayers who mocked mainstream religious life and filled the members with a superiority complex of crackpot apologia.

What about us?

EACH OF US was attracted to this religion because we were smart enough to be stupid!

We were enticed by our own FALSE SENSE of how the world works. We were persuaded we could be a part of a group that would:

1.Give us the most important work in the universe to do that filled our life with purpose.

2.Give us the most profound understanding of the hardest book ever written (the Bible) and be able to defeat anybody in argument.

3.Give us comforting reassurance that every bad thing that happens in this world is moving us forward toward A REWARD!

This seduction works at the top as well as at the bottom.

There is NOTHING left which is not presented as already UNDERSTOOD and tied up with a red ribbon of absolute certainty!

It is a pyramid scheme that requires sucking in huge numbers to sustain it (while spitting out the losers on the other side!)

The number of EX-JW's (i.e. those who KNOW BETTER and are able to speak out) are threatening the stability of the illusion now due to the Internet.

GOOD MOTIVES are illusory.

The POINT of Jehovah's Witnesses is to snuggle together and have our ignorant egos stroked that we are important as long as we obey.

At the top, the motive and the point is to keep the top spinning despite the inertian of contrary evidence.

A cult is a zero sum game for the individual member.

If you don't end up disfellowshipped, you end up disillusioned and broken and bitter. But, you can't speak out!

That is why our work to SPEAK OUT as Apostate ex-members is so vital!

I thought Eckharts you tube talk on pain bodies was interesting! He refers to ones in society at large. Maybe you can see parallels with how the WT feed disaster and pain to followers in the link below?

It's about how we all aquire, from childhood, attachments to our true self which bully and supress it (our true self is restricted by things which instill fears and guilts in us which stop us being ourselves). He calls these attachments pain bodies and egos.

Pain bodies love to feel hurt, humiliated, depressed, traumatised etc in preoccupying the real self from its presence - enjoying the NOW.

Egos thrive and seek other attentions and react to negatives.

It struck me how the WT have built up a giant pain body in each follower which oppressess and condemns the true self into submission.

It also struck me how they build up egos in leaders, to accompany their well developed 'pain bodies' which thrive on their role and suppress their true caring self enabling them to inflict guilt and fear on the pain bodies of followers.

The WT is a non-profit organization and typically non-profit organizations cannot pay dividends.

They believe it.  They may know they have some things wrong but in general they believe it.

The question really is: who will begin to disbelieve first, the top or the bottom of the pyramid?  And what will the results be from that disbelief?

On one post a few months ago yknot summed it up in just three words   1) ease  2)  ego  3) entitlement

And note that when the RC changed certain teachings they realized were wrong, the WT was quick to jeer "HAHAHAHA" they don't know what to believe, and questioned THEIR motives.

Maybe the other Churches oppose the WT because they want to PROTECT their flock from being "Kidnapped" by them. (by the way the WTsays non-believers want to kidnap their children into other faiths, too.)