brutalized toddlers

by little witch 34 Replies latest jw experiences

  • Lin
    Lin

    Jes, I remember you and your sister talking about getting beating for biting your nails, and that your dad (my idiot brother) would come home daily and check your nails for any sign of having been bitten. Argh! I think he could use some bamboo up his nails, like we were forced to read about in those darn yearbooks! RRRRRRRRRR!

  • Latte
    Latte

    I really feel for you all {{{{{{{{All}}}}}}}

    I would love to hear the borg justify the quantity of meetings. How the hell can they do that??? when the Israelites only met ONCE a week....for a joyous occaision at that!

    The poor kids....

    No doubt a lot of them are having a bad time of it at school at the moment, the Awake is repeatedly re-enforcing neutrality (flag salute etc) of late. There really is no let up for them.....

    Please see also-

    http://www.jehovahs-witness.com/forum/thread.aspx?id=2428&site=3

    Latte

  • SweatPea
    SweatPea

    as to set an example in disipline?

    Was this just in our hall, or was it from the borg? I appreciate your comments, and reflections

    My mother believed in examples of discipline. When I was about 14 years old she saw me with a "WORDLY" boy. He and I were throwing pebbles into the creek in a public park. When I got home she made me go to my room. She came in with her 1/4 inch thick, 2 inch wide raw leather strap. She left welts on my body from my shoulders to my ankles. After the beating she made me take a bath and dress in shorts. She took me to a ladies house that she was studying with that had three children around my age so they could see what happens to children who disobey. This occured in the 60's.

    Talk about embarrassed!!!!!!!!

    Edited by - sweatpea on 11 September 2002 16:56:48

  • 144thousand_and_one
    144thousand_and_one

    Whenever I've raised this issue with dubs, they always deny it. Yet I can clearly remember beatings being a normal part of the lifestyle for children of JWs. The worst that I remember was the district conventions at Dodger Stadium (Los Angeles) that were usually held in the middle of the summer, when LA sizzles. Kids were expected to sit for 8 hours a day on hard, unpadded seats, in temperatures frequently in the 100 degree range. The concession areas were filled with parents beating children who couldn't sit still under those conditions. I can remember seeing multiple parents in the same area, striking their children with belts, wooden spoons, paddles, switches, you name it, they brought their punishment implements with them to the assembly where they knew they'd get a chance to use them. Since this activity occurred on grounds that the WTS had control over as the lessee, and they did nothing to stop it from occurring, I am of the opinion that the WTS condoned it. This is supported by their continual regurgitation of the "spare the rod spoil the child" line.

    The failure of the Jehovah's Witnesses to provide day care for children at meetings and at assemblies is a horrendous reflection of the priority Jehovah's Witnesses place on the interests of their children. It is indeed a shame that many more children will be raised in this manner.

  • ugg
    ugg

    oh god,,,this is all so awful.....and worse yet,,,it is so true,,,,"sob"

  • Swan
    Swan

    My Mom loves to tell this story. When I was about 6 weeks old I was fussing in the meeting. My Mom took me back to the restroom, pulled down my diaper, and gave me a swat. Mom says I was about to cry when she told me to hush up and started to pull my diaper down again. I guess must have got the message, because I quit crying. The other sisters said "Lois, how can you do that to a little baby?" Her response was, "Well it worked, didn't it?"

    I also hated the old line, "Don't you cry or I'll give you something to cry about!"

    Tammy

  • Jankyn
    Jankyn

    Let's see...as a child, I had wood spoons, rulers and plastic hairbrushes broken on my butt & legs. I recall being slapped so hard that I got nosebleeds, and one time my mother sent a tooth flying (at least it was a baby tooth, already loose). I had JW babysitters who felt perfectly welcome to use belts to punish me for whatever infraction of the myriads and myriads of rules I had committed (My mother had to work, and wouldn't leave us with a "worldly" sitter. I was quickly "marked" as a problem child--mostly because my dad had been disfellowshipped). And the wonderful brothers in our congregation had a paint-stirring stick in the ladies' room that mothers could use on children who wouldn't behave in the meetings.

    I don't know of a single family in the congregation that I grew up in that did not use physical punishment to the point of--past the point of--abuse. And that doesn't even begin to cover the emotional and psychological abuse.

    Of course, this was in the mid to late 1960s. I don't know that even the JWs believe this is okay these days. At least, I hope not.

    Jankyn, recovering class

  • minimus
    minimus

    My mother used to try to make me feel guilty if I wasn't doing what I was supposed to do. She even tried this one:"If you do such-and-such you will LOSE Jehovah's holy spirit!" My reply: "Don't worry, I'll find it again."

  • glitter
    glitter

    When I was about 6 and my sister was very small and we were in the foyer/cloakroom inside the women's loos during the song in the middle of the Sunday meeting and one of mum's JW friends (part of a very large and very well known JW family in my city) had been hitting and shaking her little girl (about a year old) just while she was talking to mum like nothing was happening - mum was really uncomfortable and trying to calm the sister down and I was standing in front of the baby as she was crying and screaming and I was trying to tickle her and make her laugh because it was absolutely heartbreaking.

  • Cicatrix
    Cicatrix

    We had the district overseer and the circuit overseer over to our home one time for lunch (we lived five minutes from the hall). The do picked up a ruler I had in the kitchen and told me to use it to discipline my children. He said I should never use my hand, as a parent's hand signifies love to a child.

    I was talked to repeatedly for not spanking my children enough.I was counselled for removing my children from the main hall and sitting with them in the library or the restroom when they got antsy.I was told to spank them and take them back out in the main hall.

    My father used to hit me with his belt when I was little. I distinctly recall the arm that was attached to that belt was his, hand and all.

    I skipped a lot of meetings when my kid were little.

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