Posts by Wake Me Up Before You Jo-Ho

16

Holy spirit

by mrssauk in

what is the difference (if any) between being guided by holy spirit and being inspired by holy spirit?

is it just semantics?.

Wake Me Up Before You Jo-Ho

@eyeuse2badub: "Holy Spirit or fairy dust. What is the difference?"

Fairy dust has a higher success rate at capturing the light.

18

WOODSTOCK

by lastmanstanding in

it’s starting to filter in, the truth about why the grumpy buzzards wanted to move to warwick.

lol.

they are unhappy that their best time in life was moved to bethel and are hoping to relive woodstock in the place it should have been 49 years ago next month.

Dutch House of Representatives formally requests the government to start an investigation re. JW child abuse

by Anders Andersen in

today the dutch house of representatives unanimously voted to petition the government to start an investigation into jw child abuse issues.. the request from the house of reps. came after jw nl refused to listen to repeated and serious requests from the government to start an independent investigation themselves.. now it's up to the government to either accept the request by the house of reps. and start an investigation, or refuse to do so and explain to the house why.

it appears the minister of justice is not unwilling to start an investigation though.... collection of dutch news items here.

Wake Me Up Before You Jo-Ho

@sparrowdown: "David Splaine with a whiteboard, a pointer and a list of the three D's of fighting child abuse accusations.

Deny

Discredit

Destroy"

No joke, back when the Royal Commission caused its initial buzz in the community, the COBE of my congregation taught us a mantra for the platform to remember whenever a householder confronted us on the child abuse issue. He called it "The Three C's:

We don't Condone it.

We Condemn it.

And we don't Cover it up."

I remember riding home with my parents after that meeting and my father repeating it in the car for us to lock it into our memories. So, your Triple D theory is not far off from what was instructed of Witnesses back in 2015!

7

Scared Kids with cognitive dissonance

by Wakanda in

this is not about sexual child abuse, and i apologize if i put it under the wrong subject area.

stream of consciousness writing: .

i was just thinking about how before i became more of an uber dub in my teen years i was a very frightened child.

Wake Me Up Before You Jo-Ho

It's okay to be vulnerable here, @Wakanda :). We hear you.

From what I gather, your silent compliance stemmed from necessity rather than choice. When you say there were "popularity contests" among your relatives, I can just imagine the pressure you must have felt to internalize all your struggles. After all, any sign of less-than-perfect conduct is a reflection on the whole family's "reputation" in the congregation and the extended relatives. I find familiarity with you there.

While this childhood oppression you underwent may have given your short-sighted parents a handle on any challenging behaviors and emotions you would have naturally felt rising within you, it only served to store up a huge amount of difficulty later on in life... because, well, here we are talking about the "love" your parents used as a currency on an anonymous forum decades later.

I'm so sorry that your real thoughts and feelings got buried back then. I can only wonder how many more of the present generation of JW youths are also becoming the keeper of too many secrets, and appalling communicators of the many unpopular, yet important things needing addressing.

Another significant issue with the perfect JW child is, they have no experience of people being able to tolerate their badness. They've missed out on a vital privilege of a healthy child - that of being able to display envious, greedy and maniacal sides that could yet be tolerated and loved nevertheless. Instead, they are forced into a version of reality where, unless they remain in order, they are otherwise unlovable. Given your own memories and recollections, we both know children aren't stupid - they can tell when things just don't seem quite "right" in their family ideals.

The sociological breakdown of adults in the religion suffering from ailments is a well-covered issue, but I do wonder now how many psychosomatic symptoms are actually being generated in the pre-teen strata since you've mentioned your own case. This may be an area worth us investigating.

6

How would you respond?

by enigma1863 in

someone who thinks i’m an elder:.

good afternoon brother.

i am _______ and i work as a regular pioneer.

Wake Me Up Before You Jo-Ho

Good one.

My response may have been: "Cultivate your love for the spiritual heritage that has lead to the current ruling body. I know our library is quite sparse at the moment, but there are plenty of PDFs available of our earlier publications. Should we start with, say, the year 1968? I'll let you take it from there."

32

Jehovah's Witnesses: shame and domination

by john.prestor in

i want to suggest something that i've been ruminating on for a while now.

that involves the possibility that when jehovah's witnesses look for "sheep-like ones" what they're actually looking for is this: those who will allow themselves to be dominated (get rid of things that god "hates," accept the movement's beliefs without protest, not check into the movement's history) and those who are willing to be shamed (letting jehovah's witnesses into their homes when doing so is looked down upon in secular society, talking with them on the street when everyone else avoids them).. i say this because from what i observed at the kingdom halls i attended in the course of gathering data for my research i saw:.

-frequent shaming: jehovah's witnesses must do more to be acceptable to god, they are "good for nothing slaves," they are spared through armageddon by jehovah's "undeserved kindness," etc.

Wake Me Up Before You Jo-Ho

@Vidiot: "Brother Grey will see you now."

29

Pioneers, Prayers and Pills

by Wake Me Up Before You Jo-Ho in

looking back on my two decades as a jehovah’s witness, i’ve come to realize how the constant theme of endurance is playing a detrimental role on the individual's psyche.. jehovah’s witnesses have become far too good at keeping going.

they’re experts at surrendering to the demands of the watchtower, living up to what’s expected of them, and getting on with the priorities that those in power have defined and imposed upon them.

they keep showing up, presenting themselves a dutiful pioneer or ministerial servant.

Wake Me Up Before You Jo-Ho

@LevelThePlayingField Special rates for Lower Midwest clients :).

@nmthinker: "I drank so much as a JW I think I was honestly trying to kill myself and disappear." Believe me - I think there are many "sober" alcoholics within the organization. And by that, I mean, people white-knuckling their way through each day, stubbornly refusing to deal with severe issues at hand and seeking escape in their next bottle of Watchtower-labeled brandy.

Remember this face of defeat from the Bunker videos?

Her potential crime? Entertaining "negative thoughts".

The end result of her boycotting what her mind was screaming at her to pay attention to is self-apparent in the picture above.

When difficult (or "negative") feelings do threaten to emerge, the loyal Witness typically takes fright and looks away. Rather than produce an honest account of feelings, they are coached to go numb (or as the video emphasized, "deaden ourselves"). The only other option is for them to self-deceive with a version of events that is more acceptable than true...

For example, "I'm feeling very stressed from work," instead of "I can't keep up with my theocratic obligations." Or, "I'm just depressed," rather than "I'm furious with the way the brothers handled that." Or, "this movie is completely unacceptable - turn it off!" instead of, "I really want to see what happens in the end."

The Witnesses' problems are compounded by the way that many powerful feelings (especially ones of upset, frustration and betrayal) are not just censored, but strictly warned against expressing to outsiders for fear of "causing divisions". There's just one radical issue with this: feelings that are ignored don't and can't go away. They fester and manifest their energy through an array of health issues, both psychological and physical. As @doubtful1799 put it, it "makes the heart sick." Is it any wonder why each congregation reflects a jumbled bag of pharmaceutical allsorts?

The reality is, feelings are often far from wonderful and seldom should be followed. But we should accept that if we ignore, deny or overlook feelings entirely, the price will ALWAYS be higher and worse. They will exercise a powerful allying subterranean influence across the whole of our lives, buckling and straining our very system of being.

@resolute Bandicoot: "I have seen countless people reduced to mental jelly, drink way too much, fall into chronic fatigue or suffer in other terrible ways due to the alert fatigue and ideological strait jacket imposed by this bunch of clowns." And who's more easier to control and manipulate than the weak and dependent? Interesting to ponder over.

Essentially, I don't think the shelving of "negative thoughts" is any more moral, virtuous and courageous than an axe murder whose axe is put in a hard-to-reach space. You've got issues? Face them.

32

Jehovah's Witnesses: shame and domination

by john.prestor in

i want to suggest something that i've been ruminating on for a while now.

that involves the possibility that when jehovah's witnesses look for "sheep-like ones" what they're actually looking for is this: those who will allow themselves to be dominated (get rid of things that god "hates," accept the movement's beliefs without protest, not check into the movement's history) and those who are willing to be shamed (letting jehovah's witnesses into their homes when doing so is looked down upon in secular society, talking with them on the street when everyone else avoids them).. i say this because from what i observed at the kingdom halls i attended in the course of gathering data for my research i saw:.

-frequent shaming: jehovah's witnesses must do more to be acceptable to god, they are "good for nothing slaves," they are spared through armageddon by jehovah's "undeserved kindness," etc.

Wake Me Up Before You Jo-Ho

@john.prestor Happy to support that venture :).

You mentioned the tedious ping-ponging of reading paragraphs/asking questions, then answering from the paragraph (and lather, rinse, repeat).

Study conductors simply cannot cope when the student goes of script or asks additional questions. Usually, the conductor will instruct the student to "put that thought on hold," or "shelve that question for later...", and I think this is, in large part, to do with the utter chaos Jehovah's Witnesses are conditioned to anticipate should things go slightly out of the order predicated by the Watchtower - both studiously, and off duty in the real world.

They are under the strong impression that the Governing Body has provided them with the ONLY formula to navigate through existence. Anything that slightly deviates from the prescribed margins is a landslide to hell. And you see this in the Witnesses' absolute terror to ad lib during a Bible study.

5

If there is a god.....

by Crazyguy in

jw
friends

“if there is a god, and he is a loving god, then he would of given each of us a time machine” .

crazyguy.

.

Wake Me Up Before You Jo-Ho

“If there is a god, and he is a loving god, then he wouldn't give man any reason to travel back in time."

-WHAM!

47

Why didn't I leave back then???

by silentbuddha in

sunday my old bethel roommate came up to visit me.

he left a couple years ago and he wanted to catch up and reminisce.. while we sat back remembering crazy things we saw take place at bethel he reminded me of a creepy instance with bro.

swingell.. it was a saturday morning and we decided to actually go get breakfast.

Wake Me Up Before You Jo-Ho

@Tallon: "It would be a best seller!"

Let's call it: Printers and Pillows and Pacemakers - Oh My!