Has Anyone Ever Been "Shafted" By The Organization??

by minimus 25 Replies latest jw friends

  • minimus
    minimus

    Since I've been re-reading Crisis of Conscience, I've come to appreciate that many good people have been "shafted" by those in the "truth". Franz and company got the boot. My mom got removed as a Regular Pioneer. My elder friend told me Saturday that he was given the verdict by the elders from the Society that he too was booted after serving as an elder/Congregation Servant since the 50's! ......And why? Since he challenged his deletion because of going to my daughter's wedding, it took 4 MONTHS!! to be told that he was being deleted because he was not "serious". (This man is one of the most serious persons that I know of).......I've been wondering, do you know of any others that were mistreated and given the shaft from "Jehovah's loving Organization"???

  • Scully
    Scully

    I would venture to guess that the vast majority of people here are here precisely because they were shafted by the elders / local congregation.

    I guess it also depends on your definition of "shafted" - in my case I felt "shafted" because the Love? that is so often boasted about by the WTS in its publications (and I thought I did a pretty good job of showing to others) was non-existent when I was the one who needed it. That was what made me realize that these were not the disciples that Jesus promised would be his followers in John 13:34, 35.

    Love, Scully

  • minimus
    minimus

    I know a lot felt no love but I'm thinking more along the lines of being treated unfairly or getting into trouble when either you didn't really do anything wrong or others did the same thing you did and you were the only one that got punished.

  • Scully
    Scully

    I know a lot of Brothers? who were reaching out for Privileges? - even something as trivial as being the microphone handler - were told to get their hours up and do more in service, and make sure their family (if they had a wife and kids) were doing the same - and when they did, the Elders? pulled the "carrot" a little further away so that it was just out of their grasp.

    It was frustrating and exasperating to watch.

    Hmmm now that I think of it, that's how my attempt at Pioneering? went. At first the Elders? wouldn't let me try to Auxiliary Pioneer? until I had six consecutive months' worth of reports that was at least 15 hours/month. Then when I wanted to Pioneer?, they told me I had to Auxiliary Pioneer? for at least six months and improve on (by at least doubl) my magazine Placements? and same for Return Visits?. Then I found out that a certain Friend? made the Pioneer List? without having to jump through any of the hoops that they wanted me to jump through - it's just that this Friend? was an Elder's Kid?.

    That's when I decided that I'd better get a job, since the Elders? apparently didn't think of me as Pioneer? material. Funny how they started inviting me to reconsider once I bought my first car!

    Love, Scully

  • Elsewhere
    Elsewhere

    • They invite me to "make sure of all things".
    • They demand that they get to fully enjoy their rights of freedom of speech and freedom of religion.

    • When I actually do "make sure of all things" and decide that what the WTS is teaching is wrong, they call me apostate.
    • When I demand that I get to fully enjoy my rights of freedom of speech and freedom of religion, they shun me for apostasy.

    Hypocrites.

  • BLISSISIGNORANCE
    BLISSISIGNORANCE

    I guess your definition of 'shafted' makes me a definate shaftee!

    Being df'ed by 2 elders who were dealing with my kid's sexual abuse case. Why.........................

    • because the sexual abuser was never exposed, even after he confessed, and continued to go to social gatherings and play with little kids.
    • because this concerned me ALOT and I kept telling the elders they needed to do more to protect other kids, especially with the pedo's prominent dub family covering his sickness and making my family look like trouble makers, trivialising the whole matter.
    • because after 1 yr of worrying for other kids I told several mums to keep their kids away from XXX
    • because they had to silence me.

    and on what grounds?????????????............................

    • the 2 elders started to look for anything that could incriminate me and give them a chance to df me. They started to ring ALL my friends in the borg, questioning them, asking if I had ever said anything specific about XXX or his family to them. They got no satisfaction.
    • one of the elder's daughter befriended me and one day she brought up the incident (she knew about it) and asked if I thought there had been anything like sexual abuse going on in the pedo's family, with the older bro who was an MS in the congo. I said "I didn't want to talk about it but that I did wonder about things." (because the older bro always touched and tickled young girls, not saying that to her.)
    • the elder's daughter rang her father and said I had implied that pedo's ms bro had interfered with pedo.
    • he rang a friend of his daughter and said I must have said something in conversation to her that implied the pedo's family had abuse problems. She said I said to her (a year earlier) that I felt the pedo's family was WIERD! Yep, that was the basis for their case against me.
    • they formed a jc with the 3rd elder being a yes man. they told me they had 2 witnesses to my slanderous comments about bro ms and i had better confess.
    • I said I had never implied that bro ms was a pedo. They said a committe was formed and it would go better for me if I was honest.
    • at the hearing I knew nothing I said mattered but I was not confessing to anything I didn't do or say.
    • I got df'ed for 1.SLANDER 2.LYING 3.LOOSE CONDUCT (for not being obedient to the elders when they told me not to discuss the abuse with anyone)

    One year out, 3 attempts to go back.............3rd time reinstated, congregation clapped on the announcement....................... 2 more years struggling in the borg.................entire family walked away and never looked back.

    I wanted to be reinstated before I left because I knew if I'ld left while df'ed the pedo and his family could have covered their tracks by saying we were weak, wrong, disgruntled etc. But by going back I could tell as many as possible about the corrupt elders, jc and organizational procedures...........warn more mums...........and then leave with my middle finger up at them.

    I am not df'ed or da'ed at this point and that's good because I still talk to dubs if I can, even had one ring me yesterday!

    Cheers, Bliss (of the shafted class)

  • LittleToe
    LittleToe

    Yeah, my dad was shafted several times, by being taken off as an Elder. ONce of the nicest men you are ever likely to meet, too.

    I didn't give them a chance to shaft me, I shafted them first

  • StinkyPantz
    StinkyPantz

    How are we defining "shafted"?

  • kwintestal
    kwintestal

    Yes I was shafted. I was used as a scape-goat for the elder's kids who were going out and getting drunk and high every weekend. The word got out that it was going on, and I was the one who was DF'd for it, even though I was no part of it. I was disfellowsipped for "loose conduct", but everyone "knew" that it was for getting drunk and high on the weekends with the elder's kids, and heck, those elder's kids must have been a lot more repentant then I.

    On the plus side, in the next 4 months, 4 of those elders stepped down or were removed for their kids actions.

    Kwin

  • mama
    mama

    well minimus, you decide. When i was 22 my roomate and i recieved a visit from our elders, seems ppl in the hall had gone to them concerned that my roomate and i were involved in lesbian behaviors. Why? because at a party we put our arms around each other. It gets better! Then they read counsel from the bible on homosexuality to us, then, say that others in the hall are concerned because we rent an apartment below two guys! So which is it, we are lesbians, or sleeping with the boys upstairs. I was livid, but I maintained my cool because I knew they would take my anger as guilt. I stopped going to meetings then, left the religion, got a boyfriend etc. Several years later, I went back to it, had a crazy roomate, broke up with my guy, and i was homesick, so stupid me, i went back to it. Had a committee meeting, had to confess all my sins to elders who had known me since i was a baby, very humiliating. They asked questions that they didn't need to know the answers to, like did i enjoy the intercourse with my boyfriend, i guess if i said no they would have been happy. I think one was quiet the pervert. They privately reproved me because everything i had done was done across country, so the cong. didn't know anything. After a year or so, i met a guy and we starting dating, fell in love and oops had sex, we decided to tell the elders feeling guilty for our sins. They told me if i had nothing to do with him i would not be disfellowshipped, ( you see, there were alot of bad little elders kids getting in crap and they decided to make my boyfriend the scapegoat because his daddy wasn't an elder and he was from away), they painted him out to be the devil. So when i married him anyway, we were both disfellowshipped. The reason they gave me was that i was an unrepentant fornicator. How can you be unrepentant when you freely go and tell on yourself, i wasn't pregnant, could of kept my mouth shut like many i know, but i told the truth, so much for loving kindness!!! Anyway, to make a long story shorter, we eventually left the cult. THank God! But I have heard many worst stories than mine. My hubby was sexually abused as a child by a prominent elder, as was his best friend, and his wife, my best friend was sexually abused by her own father when he was an elder! They all make me sick, and I consider myself lucky and blessed by God to be rid of them.

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