Jehovah’s Witnesses stand in the long tradition of persecuted new religions. The list is long.
There have been the Quakers, Puritans, Cathars, Huguenots, etc. even Catholics. People who at different times have suffered and died for Truth as they understood it.
The problem the witnesses face is what happens in religions all the time. The rules take over and before you know it you discover you are following a man. In the case of the Witnesses a committee of men.
If you think that persecution is the measure of the true religion, then take that up with the FDLS. Their leader Warren Jeffs is in prison and his followers are persecuted too. Persecution comes easy if you break up families and develop a reputation for caring for the protection of pefophiles over the welfare of children.
Those words from John 15 heartened some of us to leave the ranks of men followers. “Those who are cowards and without faith” says Revelation. Some of those scriptures cut two ways.