Double Lives and Disfellowshipping

by joelbear 9 Replies latest jw friends

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  joelbear

  We read a lot on here of the high number of witnesses, young and old, who have lived or are living double lives so that they will not be disfellowshipped and lose their social and family support structures.

  We all know the mess this makes in people's lives and psychological health.

  To me its an interesting by product of man trying to be God's policemen. It doesn't work. Its a poorly constructed manmade plan that people just figure out a way to get around for the most part.

  Clean organization indeed. Propaganda.

  take care

  Joel
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  ballistic

  hi joelbear,
  I agree with you about double lives. The subject comes up a couple of times in my story which I posted recently. I think it maybe the product of trying to live by impossible standards, and the result can be pretty scarey - a major head fk.
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  Room 215

  Right on, Joel,

  A lot, if not most, of the decent, if humanly flawed, people occupying the seats at your local Dumbdown Hall fit your description. The system spawns it. What a charade!
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  Pathofthorns

  The whole matter of so many pretending, but believing it's the 'truth' just enough that it has an incredible hold on their minds is just bizarre. The scale this is going on is staggering.

  I find their control is effective in creating people who are good 'actors', but when it comes down to it, JWs do what they want but just do it quietly or in certain circles.

  At some point all of this pretending to be something they are not has to catch up with them, if it already hasn't begun to do so.

  Path
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  avengers

  Good point. I have seen lives destroyed, teens that get into conflicts and start using drugs, etc, etc.

  This is indeed a Great (B)organization.
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  Pathofthorns

  That is a good point about drug and alcohol addictions. People who need help in the JW community are hessitant about getting it, because it involves a judicial committee. If they want help, there is no one here to do anything more than give them a few WT articles to read. Sad.

  Path
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  rhett

  I remember back in the 80's my sister was friends with a couple sisters and their brother had the hots for Amy (my sister). The guy appeared to be a nice stable JW boy. That was until the night he snapped. While cleaning the car dealership (I wonder what the percentage is of JW's who clean for a living) and high as the sky he trashed the place, stole all the cash, and one of the nice new cars. Being the oh so nice guy that he was he didn't want his family to have to deal with all the heartache and pain so what did he do to prevent that? Try to kill them. He went home, covered the entire place in gas while they were sleeping and lit a match. This was in Kentucky and he was found a few days later in another stolen car in Oklahoma.
  From what I've heard the guy is now an elder in prison. Can't wait for this guy to get on the outside world again.

  I don't need to fight
  To prove I'm right
  I don't need to be forgiven.
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  LB

  If it weren't for a double life, I'd have no life at all.

  Actually my son was a teen while attending meetings. He was a pretty decent kid who was trying very hard to follow the rules. When I asked him why he only had 2 witness friends he told me it was because the others weren't exactly what I thought they were. That he would be better off hanging with his friends from school who attended other churches.

  Had to be frustrating for those kids.

  
  Never Squat With Yer Spurs On
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  Bendrr

  Joel, I have the feeling that "double lives" are more common in The Empire than we can imagine. Like my brother told me last night, he "had to experience life". He made a comment similar to LB's son, that pretty much all the young people were doing it.
  With the vast list of "don'ts" it's little suprise that you see so much of this going on.

  I may not like what you have to say, but many men gave their lives for your right to say it.
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  SYN

  I led a double life for the LONGEST time...the last couple of years were a joke, really. I just didn't want to rock the boat before I moved out of my parents' house, is all.

  During my last meeting with the elders, I was a very bad boy - I made up a lot of stories about some ppl in my ex-cong. who had pissed me off and acted all prissy towards me, simply because my parents weren't as rich as theirs, and although I feel bad about it today, it was worth it seeing the looks on those elders' faces.

  The sad thing was, they wrote down every word I said and their faces looked as if I was telling them something straight out of the Bible. If I hadn't been so nervous I would have been laughing my silly ass off at that point, but I was close to crying, so that didn't happen.

  They also told me that they knew what I was doing 'behind their backs'. There you go - apparently my 'loving brothers' had been informing the elders about my less-than-wholesome activities. Now before you ppl get the impression that I'm a coke snorter or something, NO, these things involved grrls. Well, women actually, to be precise. hehe.

  Worst of all, by the time they left, I was basically a wreck - these specific elders had actually been very kind towards me for many years (one of them was the real deal - he was a guy you could relate to, a kind, but stern sort of guy - I still love him to this day. He was the Junior Elder, there were two of 'em.) But the senior elder was all harsh and crude about the deal, as they were leaving I called out 'goodbye guys, thanks for coming!' and the older one ignored me, just frowning and carrying on walking.

  God, that was a difficult day.

  "I see no good reasons why the views given in this volume should shock the religious sensibilities of anyone." -- Charles Darwin, The Origin Of Species, 1869.