The most disturbing part of being a Jehovahs Witness was going in service and talking about which house you would live in when the householder and theyre family were killed.
Bleah!
Jehovah's Witnesses & their cynical lust for negativity
by jambon1 19 Replies latest jw friends
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neverendingjourney
It's kind of a chicken-and-the-egg question. Are negative people attracted to the WT or does the WT turn people's outlooks negative? I suspect it's a little of both.
My father is one of the most negative people I know. He's in his 60's and literally has no friends. He hardly speaks with his own family and my mother's family tries to avoid him at all cost. It's no wonder he was attracted to the WT's gloom and doom message. It was in synch with his already-negative outlook.
My mom was overprotective and was scared she would lose her kids to the streets (we grew up poor), so it makes sense that she was attracted to the WT. She knows next to nothing about WT doctrine, but she liked seeing well-dressed, obedient kids (although coerced) kids at the meetings. It seemed like a perfect way to legitimize her overbearing ways.
On the other hand, I saw some healthy, normal people join the WT's ranks and become embittered with time. Maybe it's the stress of the lifestyle, the constant reminders of our "imperfection, and/or the realization that people treat you differently after you get baptized that zaps people of their positive outlook.
But there's no doubt that the negativity comes from the top down. It's an effective way to keep control of the sheep. If you come to view everything around you in a negative light, then you become dependent on the new system as the only solution to your problems.
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WTWizard
I can remember every single experience with worldly people that is detailed on the platform is bad. The trip to the store that ends in a robbery, someone leaving the cancer only to get AIDS, horrible car accidents because of going with the world instead of staying in the cancer--all these have been heard from the platform. And, that illustration with the train coming to a bridge that's out--each one having to individually pull the emergency stop--what a crappy illustration (not only does only one person have to pull the stop, but there is no bridge out ahead).
What they ignore is the fact that there are only a few men causing all this trouble. If just a few men were taken out of power (not having virtually the whole population wiped out), the world would quickly stop being so horrible. Most of the economic depressions, wars, shortages, and disease problems are engineered by a few men (those running the central banks), and without these humanoids running things, pretty soon we could get a president that would solve the problems and put the remaining regulators out of business. Do that, and before long we have a world in which people are solving problems for a living, not just "managing" them. And, soon thereafter, people will solve all the shortages, money issues, health problems, transportation problems, and these religions that bash the world and create all too many of our wars. All without Jehovah getting any credit whatsoever.
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Badger
That's common with apocalyptic groups...When you focus on the end of everything, then every horrible event points to or prepares you for that end.
Depressions, Disasters, Starvations, War...It all is evidence that you're about to go someplace better, and is greeted with excitment from the recognition of that. It's incredibly selfish, puting the happiness of yourself over the basic welfare of everyone else.
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boyzone
I always thought I was a positive person until I left. Then when I had the comparison I could see just how negative I'd become. It was really nice to give yourself permission to look at the good in the world instead of just the bad- and it was nice to see.
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carla
"They are gleeful" -- It's funny you used that word, I used that word for my jw when he first was getting into all of this and a few years after particularly. There were some things going on in the news and he was literally 'gleeful' about it!! From a guy who never got up early to getting up early just to go get the newspaper and point out these certain sins/crimes committed by another group! His very real obsession with CNN, MSNBC, FOX (not so much) and ALL the news channels morning, noon, 5:00, 6:00 (until I put a stop to that) and the 10:00 news, then comes the talking head shows later! He loves bad news.
A way to counter that? One way is to try to keep up with good news, neighbors helping neighbors, random acts of kindness, teens volunteering, etc..... One more way is to know many, many jw stories of crime and stories told here and elsewhere about jw's then when your jw attempts to tell you how bad all the 'other' people are you can relate a similiar story, no need to mention jw's, they will know especially when you say you know about x and the org they are associated with simply swept it under the carpet or something to that effect. Jw's cannot stand hearing stories about jw's getting in the news.
If you point out to them that if they continually look for the bad stories that is what they will find, you know, kind of like what they say about apostates only looking for 'bad' things about the wt.
Here is a little story, sorry I did not cite the author-
Deep inside each of us a fight between two wolves. One is evil. He is anger, envy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, lies and pride. The other wolf is good. He is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindess, generosity, truth, compassion, and faith. The same fight is going on inside of you and inside of everybody.
The grandson thinks for a moment and then asks his grandfather, "which will win?" The old Chrokee simply replies, "The one you feed."
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mrsjones5
"Here is a little story, sorry I did not cite the author-
Deep inside each of us a fight between two wolves. One is evil. He is anger, envy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, lies and pride. The other wolf is good. He is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindess, generosity, truth, compassion, and faith. The same fight is going on inside of you and inside of everybody.
The grandson thinks for a moment and then asks his grandfather, "which will win?" The old Chrokee simply replies, "The one you feed."
I like
Josie
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carla
oops, sorry that should read Cherokee, I'm sure you knew that. My jw was getting up and didn't have time to edit.
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Scarred for life
I agree that they are gleeful about any bad news in the world. The last 3 times I have seen my JW uncle he has made a point to talk about the economic situation we are in and terrible it is and how its getting worse and how bad unemployment is. Then he points out how its all a sign that the "end is near". Gleeful is a good word to describe him.
My mother never got past this although she hadn't attended meetings in many years. She was absolutely obsessed with bad news. CNN and MSNBC were on constantly.
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sass_my_frass
Negativity certainly caught on to my mum and always my mum's daughter. I think a couple of my sibling let it bypass them but another couple went a bit down. I agree that it's top-led; anytime we heard a talk by a bethelite they were the angriest, crankiest old buggers who had no joy in their lives now that they were looking into death in the near future and they hadn't got what they wanted out of life. (Okay, that last sentence was probably drawing a long bow...)