Is It Fair To Discipline Born-Into-It's?

by Englishman 35 Replies latest jw friends

• 

  joannadandy

  I'm sorry to hear about what happened to you puff, and obviously every situation is going to be different.

  I agree under your circumstances, you didn't have a choice...and that just plan sucks. I guess my response was aimed more towards those who got baptized in late teens. While I don't agree with why they did it, by then you have some idea of why you did what you did, and what the rules are. And generally it's not under the pressure of the world is going to end in t-minus 3 months. But when I was 13 I knew what fornication was. I knew why people got Df'd and that they couldn't talk to them anymore. Hell at 12 I remember reading the part about pre-marital sex being bad, and wrong and saying to myself, at 12 mind you, "OH man I am never gonna make it". But then again my situation was different. The world was not going to end, I could make up my mind when I was ready.

  Besides, I always thought that as a kid, you wouldn't have died in the tribulation because you hadn't come to a FULL understanding. So it wasn't your fault. Isn't that sort of a catholic thing, that hurry up baptize this kid so they don't burn? I thought JW's didn't want to be like catholics at all and that was why their system was so wonderful...what a load of crap...
• 

  Englishman

  Let me expand on this a little bit. Now I get personal!

  I was baptised at age 12 at Yankee stadium, simply because I thought that that was what I should do. But, I was just thinking with the programming that my parents had given me, this was not me, it was their thoughts. I wasn't expressing myself, I was expressing them.

  Now how about this, at 17 I met a 16 year old JW and we became an item. When I was 20 and she was 19 we became engaged. However, her JW father would not allow us to marry and remained adamant that she would not marry until she reached the legal age which was then 21.

  Eventually, after knowing each other for 4 (FOUR!) years, we caved in and did the business. I was by then 21 and she was 20. We were hauled in front of a DF'ing committee and roasted. The fact that her father (number 2 honcho) had refused us permission to marry was not even mentioned.

  Now the point that I am trying to make is that we did not have any nookies for 4 years because of what our parents had taught us. Privately, we both felt that God was not sitting up in the clouds watching what we did with our genitals.

  The result of all this was that I was forbidden to see my fiance unaccompanied AT ALL. A year later we parted, she went into a disastrous marriage and so did I. ( Her Ladyship was not on the scene then!)

  So, all the development that I should have been going through in my teens and 20's, was now being thwarted by my JW parents and also now by a malevolent JC who forbade me to ever be alone with the woman that I intended to marry.

  Consequently, it has become ever clearer to me that all born-into-its have their maturation processes so badly affected that I doubt if many of them are capable of making a rational decision at any time in their lives, never mind at age 30. It's only when these ones leave that they even start to mature, which is probably why so many of us finish up scrapping with one another here.

  Scrapping that is normally over with one's teenage years!

  Englishman.
• 

  teenyuck

  Consequently, it has become ever clearer to me that all born-into-its have their maturation processes so badly affected that I doubt if many of them are capable of making a rational decision at any time in their lives, never mind at age 30. It's only when these ones leave that they even start to mature, which is probably why so many of us finish up scrapping with one another here.

  That is the point and I believe it.

  I heard about fornication, what JW kid did not? Did I know what it was? No, I was a 13 year old girl with no hope of a boyfriend and no worldly friends to tell me what it all meant.

  My parents idea of teaching my sister and I the birds and the bees was to let us watch our dog, a pure breed Fox Terrier, get "bred" with a pure bred boy Fox Terrier. Watching two dogs do it at the age of 9 is not a great education on what sex is. My mother explained that what the dogs were doing is what people do to make babies. YUCK!!

  I was not able to make good decisions until my late 20's. As a child I was so immature and backwards. I simply did not know about stuff other kids my age did.

  Getting baptized at age 13, with the end of the world around the corner, is wrong. Letting a kid get baptized now at the same age is wrong. The belief that armageddon is coming and to be saved you need to be dunked to have a chance is mental and emotional abuse. Using this fear to get converts is wrong. We were never told that children would be spared. If you were not baptized, you would die. When I would ask about the young children in the cong, my mother explained that Jehovah will make the decision....if they have a good heart, they might be spared.

  Wait til the kid can legally drink. Then see if they still want to get dunked. If so, they have a much better understanding of what is happening.
• 

  BONEZZ

  Englishman,

  This hits home as I was born into it but my father (elder) was smart enough to never push. He always said it would have to be an personal decision. I studied with umpteen people and went thru questions at various times...saved many times by the fact that we would move and become inactive for awhile so I would get to start over. I always had a gnawing feeling in the back of my head that something was screwy but of course you just don't get to compare religions like normal people. I can see the look on my parents faces if I'd asked to study something besides society literature. Amazing is right to a degree, they do treat you better while you can be counted as a study, but eventually if you are in one congregation long enough, you start hearing the old line..."he's never gonna make the Truth his own." I think the secret is to move around a lot and always be a study. I always felt I was gonna be destroyed because I had not got baptised. I was one of those guys who wanted to see it all start and then get dunked. Of course, they scared me shitless by those talks that said the door would shut and it would be too late once the "Great Trib" got under way. They always compared to Noah's day and the doors on the Ark being shut. Hell, I still have nightmares.

  Englishman..was that the '58 convention in New York? I was there too but only 7 years old. Still remember quite a bit though.

  -BONEZZ
• 

  StinkyPantz

  I feel like kind of a youngster, but I had similar experiences as all of you. I too was baptized at age 13 in 1992. I did it because all of my friends and I decided to do it that particular summer. I memorized all of my questions perfectly and was honestly committed to the religion until 2 years ago. I understood the consequences and I was sure that I would never ever break the rules (at 13).

  I would have to agree though, that my maturation was stunted. I didn't even have sex until I was 21 because I never wanted to date any of the JW boys. The only ones left by the time I was that old were gross! And when I did started dating it was hard. I didn't know what "wordly" guys expected. I knew nothing about dating! It sucked.
• 

  invisible

  Hello Englishman

  I agree wholeheartedly. There was no choice, just constant pressure, recriminations, punishments, beatings, humiliations. JW children to some in the 'truth' must be viewed as only scum by older members of the congregation. Well aware of their own shortcomings and not wanting their own children to make the same 'mistakes' gave them the excuse needed to belittle us at every opportunity from developing by normal standards. The second we tried to be ourselves, make our own imformed choice based upon our own character makeup, it was then that we simply got punished for even when we thought we were just being good and normal. After a while, all distinctions of normal behaviour development go out the window, you know not who you are as an individual anymore. Not even afforded any protection from the state and the social welfare system you simply fall through every gap in provision, cast out, unwanted, of no use to anyone, worthless, degraded and utterly powerless.

  For these reasons I hate from some deep part of me everything that the WT stands for. They completely ruined my life for years upon years.

  Celtic Mark

  Edited by - invisible on 17 June 2002 11:36:16
• 

  Englishman

  Englishman..was that the '58 convention in New York? I was there too but only 7 years old. Still remember quite a bit though.

  Bonnez,

  Indeed it was the '58 assembly. My grandmother took me there when I was aged 12. We sailed on the 'Arosa Star' from Southampton, England, I can even recall the address at which we stayed, 3071 Heath Avenue, Bronx, NewYork. Lovely!.

  I was baptised at Orchard Beach. Later we sweated the hot days out in the Polo Grounds then returned home on the 'Arosa Sun'.

  Englishman.
• 

  BONEZZ

  Englishman,

  Probably saw you there...ha. Lots of people, that's what I remember. We too stayed at a private residence in the Bronx too... I believe that was set up thru, I think it was called the "rooming" dept. I remember huge NY 'roaches when we came in at night and turned on the lights. They would scurry into the cracks. Since I was from out in the boonies, it was probably the first time I'd seen black kids. Got to play with them outside. I think they were "worldly" but my parents let me play anyway. I remember they could jump rope real well....I fell down real well. Do you remember all those Fans that they sold outside the conventions? I had quite a collection of them. We went every day to Yankee Stadium. Walked over the bridge to see the Polo Grounds one day but never went in...don't know why. I also remember they used to sell pie and other stuff there...plus they had regular meals that you would stand in line for...metal trays...under the tents. That was maybe one time when I did not feel weird about be affiliated...probably because were so many of us.

  -BONEZZ
• 

  teenyuck

  After a while, all distinctions of normal behaviour development go out the window, you know not who you are as an individual anymore. Not even afforded any protection from the state and the social welfare system you simply fall through every gap in provision, cast out, unwanted, of no use to anyone, worthless, degraded and utterly powerless.

  For these reasons I hate from some deep part of me everything that the WT stands for. They completely ruined my life for years upon years.

  Wow, Celtic, you nailed it.
• 

  Matty

  Englishman

  , you must have felt really cool at one time saying you got baptised there! Much sexier than saying you were baptised at Plymouth or Wolverhampton! While I was growing up, brothers and sisters fell into two camps, those who were at Yankee Stadium in '58, and those who weren't. To a lesser extent it's a similar thing in the UK with the Wembley conventions in 1963 and 1969.

  Puffsrule, I agree - Celtic nailed it allright. Even when someone is experienced enough to make a mature decision about whether or not to be a Jehovah's Witness, how can they if they have been bombarded with Watchtower propaganda their entire life? Us Born-Into-It's are pretty much the most enraged here.

  It's all about the distorted definition of the word 'choice' and 'decision'. Nobody in my family would ever accept the charge of emotional blackmail, although this is precisely what is happening to me. The witness logic is that if someone you love is recklessly walking towards the end of a cliff, or doing anything else that would mean their imminent death, you would try and thwart their recklessness. As far as Jehovah's Witnesses are concerned the end of the world is a fait accompli, so leaving "the truth" put simply, is an act of suicide. It's little wonder that the "free to go at any time" assurance doesn't hold any water. There is also the issue that anyone leaving the organisation are insulting God and taking Satan's side. This is the kind of climate that makes leaving the single most toughest decision that any person born into the religion can make. Born-Into-It's who get disfellowshipped early and then see the Jehovah's Witness religion for what it is are lucky. Unfortunately I have led an 'exemplary' life, and so such decisions have not been forced onto me.