It is probably an unpopular view, but we are responsible for ourselves. Focus feels duped by who ever converted him to Witness theology. Others feel similarly. But we are responsible for the decisions we make. If we failed to investigate before conversion, the fault is our own. If we persist in believing the impossible, that’s our fault too. If we adopted a manner of life we found we could not sustain, we made that decision.
Blaming others for our walk in life makes us resemble a guilty child who shouts, “I didn’t do it!” Witnesses do not hold a knife to anyone’s back. They persuade, apply social pressure, hold out a system of “holiness” and reward. But if we were persuaded to believe, the final decision was our own. Assume responsibility for yourself.
What Focus does resembles a tempering child. If we seek to dissuade others from being Witnesses or simply wish to put our own case forward, we do not succeed by being an abusive, screaming child. We may do so by being a rational adult.
Focus makes many claims. Others on this board can make better ones and with a firmer basis for them. However, it is not a claim about oneself that matters. It is rational discourse. If we were convinced that Witness doctrine was rational, most of us do not see it that way now. If we wish to reach others, we do it best by being rational, factual and honest. One cannot be or project any of those things by ranting.
Those who quietly wrote letters back before Focus even questioned Witness belief, who met in person with Watchtower authorities, who cornered them at conventions or in the hallways at Bethel and put difficult questions to them are the real heroes of this story. The brash and rude and irrational are not. They cloud the issue.
The Witness organization tries to remove one’s sense of personal responsibility and standing before God, replacing it with the mind of the elders and other Witness hierarchy. That may explain why some of us focus on others, when we made the decisions that took us into the Witness organization and out of it again.
Focus, I do not see maturity in your future.