I guess it's not too late to jump in with a little personal history, as I detect that's what this thread is for.
My maternal great-grandmother was at the Cedar Point, Ohio assembly back in the teen or twenties or whenever. Thus my family has had the tentacles of the society insinuating themselves through its structure for many, many years.
My maternal grandmother picked up on the party line and was successful in entrapping two of her four children: an uncle and my mother. My father resisted until I was just back from college, to which he insisted I go. If he had been in the Borg prior, he would have attempted to prevent me going, tyrant that he is.
I had one foot in and one foot out the whole time I was "in." I mean I was in college in the sixties. And I was a top 40 disc-jockey on the top rock and roll station in town. Could you have stood that close to an orgy and not jumped in? Me neither.
After college, I made the colossal mistake of marrying a Dub. And life went decidedly downhill for the next 26 years, although I did have the good sense of getting out of the dubs in my middle twenties. That is, I took the foot that had been "in" out. It was over the beard issue, which neither the elders nor the service desk could answer to my satisfaction. This led to lots of questions about lots of other topics that had always puzzled me and eventually led me out.
In my long and checkered career, I've been lots of things, some of which involved actual work. But I've always returned to writing.
Looking back on my 56 years of life, I can say without the slightest trace of hesitation that fully 95% of the pain I've experienced has been a direct consequence of my non-volunatry association with Jehovah's Witnesses.
If I could do just ONE thing differently, it would be that I would have stayed as far away from Jehovah's Witnesses as I could have gotten. It's a destructive, devisive, evil bunch. But then, you all know that.
Sincere Best Wishes for You All,
Frank Tyrrell
