For those who joined as adults

by brainwashed-from-birth 27 Replies latest jw friends

• 

  John Doe

  Had nothing to do with sanity or intelligence.

  Extrapolate that to any religious belief.
• 

  John Doe

  .
• 

  snowbird

  Why don't you use your posterior to test the extracting ability of one of those front-loading washers at Home Depot?

  Sylvia
• 

  elder-schmelder

  There are 3 reason that people join:

  1: Born and raised in it.

  2: Life crisis - drug or alcohol addiction, death of friend or family, poverty.

  3: Crazy - don’t fit in with the rest of the world. (We all know who I am talking about at the KH)

  elder-schmelder
• 

  snowbird

  poverty.

  Yours truly.

  Emotional, spiritual, as well as material.

  Sylvia
• 

  yknot

  .....some people join because they feel the world is becoming immoral and then some JW shows up appearing to uphold their moral beliefs....

  I would akin it to watching 'Little House on the Prairie' and deciding the 1800s were more wholesome and desirable.......disregarding the facts of lacking the social constructs, laws, modern medicine or indoor plumbing..... the moral espousing, well dressed JW represents this idealistic POV but like the reality of the 19th century the realities of life under WTS control is often times far more time consuming, burdenous and lacks full liberty for it's citizens.

  Don't get me wrong I love LHoP and Holly Hobbit as much as any child of the era.......but I wouldn't trade that period for my legal rights or modern appliances!.
• 

  dgp

  Lisa Vegas, you wrote:

  I think in my parents case lack of education did play a big part. My dad could not read, the JW's taught him with the "Learn to Read and Write" book. My mom was 16 and a highschool drop out, with a baby the 'sisters' taught her what she needed to know to raise a child.

  I think your parents joined because they indeed felt this was their salvation. In some ways, the witnesses indeed helped them very much. However, I can see that they also took advantage of the tremendous needs your parents had. That was immoral.

  WTWizard: poorer countries have more access to the internet than we credit them for. A factor in people not knowing what they are getting into could be the fact that the wealth of information is not in their own languages. However, the witnesses face some troubles even there. In Africa, the Catholic Church has grown 700% - that is right, seven hundred percent- in the last years (the source doesn't say how many). Protestant churches are also experiencing "explosive" growth. That means that many people who are otherwise discontent or are impressionable are drawn to other religions first, and in much larger numbers. And then, these people can't provide as much money as other countries. If the Watchtower stops growing in developed countries, which is where they get their money, it will have serious financial trouble.

  Just by posting here, we're all making a small contribution.
• 

  CHILD

  I began studying at age 20. I no longer attended the church of my youth and did not know the bible. Like snowbird, I was impressionable and the JWs seemed to know the bible well. The kool-aid tasted good.