Expert: Andrew - 11/5/2007

Question
hi i am one of Jehovah witnesses. we do not use 'social pressure & deceptive manipulations to undermine family ties & control minds'. we do not control minds to do that you will have to hypnotize and we stay clear away from that because the bible warns use about that. we teach exactly what the bible teachers. our bible has been translated word for word. there are bibles that don't even have the name of god in it and some do have it once in psalms 83.18 it says that gods name is JEHOVAH. the original bible has the name JEHOVAH and so does ours its in it hundreds of times. what do you mean that "People who lie cannot represent a God of Truth." we do not lie we teach the truth we teach what the bible says.
oh we are not a cult in the dictionary cult means "A religion or religious sect generally considered to be extremist or false, with its followers often living in an unconventional manner under the guidance of an authoritarian, charismatic leader" we live like every one else and we let anyone in and if they don't like it they can leave and unlike the brethren that don't allow outsiders that have family inside see them. Jehovah witnesses do not have a rule saying your are not allowed to speak to family members that are not Jehovah witnesses. and our leader is Jehovah how is god of the entire world and universe. and we not false. do you think the bible is false? because like i said before we teach exactly what the bible teaches.
heres a question for you, do you know of any religion that is in every country in the WHOLE ENTIRE WORLD? Jehovah's Witnesses are. you should really get to know Jehovah's Witnesses and there religion before becoming a critic when you have no idea what we are like and what our religion is really about.

Answer
Dear Anonymous Questioner,

> hi i am one of Jehovah witnesses. we do not use 'social
> pressure & deceptive manipulations to undermine family
> ties & control minds'.

Yes, you do use exactly this tactic. I was a JW for 30 years, then participated in active recovery for 10 years. That contrast has taught me many things that I did not know while I was still a Witness, things that you do not yet know. You cannot see certain things without contrast, without a new point of view. You cannot see certain things until you break the "spell" of mind control and see through your own natural eyes again like you did before you entered into cult mind. You are wearing a mask which cult researchers call the "cult pseudopersonality". You see everything through that mask, not with your own natural eyes. Therefore everything you see is colored by it. You give your organization the power to reframe every issue and you obediently look at the issue in the way they frame it. You give them even the power to redefine words, as every cult does, because as George Orwell taught the world, he who can redefine words can control minds.

> we do not control minds to do that you will have to
> hypnotize and we stay clear away from that because the
> bible warns use about that.

You imagine hypnotism is a way that people can be influenced against their will, and the only way. Cult researchers Robert J. Lifton, Margaret T. Singer, Leon Festinger, Janja Lalich, Steven Hassan, and many others disagree with you. There is another way called cult mind control, which uses a simultaneous and complex series of tactics to overwhelm critical thinking faculties and make members give up their own decision making process, handing it over to another. Mr. Lifton identifies "eight marks of a mind control cult". Your organization carries every one of the eight marks.

> we teach exactly what the bible teachers. our bible has
> been translated word for word.

Your spiritual doctrines are not at issue. Even if you follow "bible teachings" precisely, this is no evidence that you have not added to it cult mind control tactics. Free will is a constant of the universe. Even your own body of teachings insists that God wants his children to exercise free will.

Yet your organization circumvents free will by influencing it's members to abandon free will.

> what do you mean that "People who lie cannot represent a
> God of Truth." we do not lie we teach the truth we teach
> what the bible says.

Your organization lies, and by repeating precisely what your organization teaches, you lie. For example, your organization lied by setting dates for the end of the world. This has occurred not once or twice, but many times. Your organization taught "the generation that saw the events of 1914 will see the end of the world". Most of the people born in 1914 are now dead. Those remaining are 93 years old. This prophecy has failed as many other Watchtower prophecies before it did. Predictably, in order to cover up the failed prophecy, the Watchtower Society redefined the word "generation" in the year 1995, and promptly blamed members for believing exactly what the Watchtower Society had previously taught them to believe.

Presuming to speak for God by prophesying, then being caught in false prophesying, then failing to take responsibility, but instead covering it up by redefining words and blaming the student for having "misinterpreted" is a complex lie. Those who speak lies cannot represent the God of Truth.

> oh we are not a cult in the dictionary cult means "A
> religion or religious sect generally considered to be
> extremist or false, with its followers often living in an
> unconventional manner under the guidance of an
> authoritarian, charismatic leader"

Your religion is generally considered to be extremist and false. Your followers live in an unconventional manner. Your followers are under the guidance of the most authoritarian leadership in the world. You damn yourself by your own definition.

> we live like every one else

Watchtower literature year after year condemns the world as "lying in the power of the wicked one" and contrasts the way the world lives with the way Witnesses live, hypocritically and self-righteously setting Witnesses up as morally superior.

Yet in this moment, it serves your argument to forget this dominant Watchtower teaching. This is an example of seeing only through the filter of your "cult pseudopersonality", thinking that the truth is malleable to your convenience. It is not.

It is true that the world lives nothing at all like your people, but not in the way your literature frames it. The rest of the world uses critical thinking faculties, and makes free will choices, and is free from an orchestrated and authoritarian system of deception.

Your denial of the truth agreed upon by all parties only now in this moment because it is not convenient in the moment represents a sort of deceptive mental trickery that comes  easily for people who are accustomed to deceptive mental trickery.

> we let anyone in and if they don't like it they can leave
> and unlike the brethren that don't allow outsiders that
> have family inside see them.

You coerce people to come in by repeatedly visiting them until finally you catch them in a weak moment, then love bombing them and telling them half truths, such that they do not learn the other half until they are in too deeply to change their minds. They cannot leave because your organization has coerced them into cutting off relationships with former friends and family, so that they have no one in the world to support them except their "congregational family" which exercises only conditional "love". They even believe that they will be abandoned by God and become an enemy of the Most High for not fully supporting the unimaginably extensive Witness talmud. They live in terror, afraid of displeasing God, when in fact God is Love, and nothing we could ever do would disqualify us from receiving his no-strings-attached love. He cannot stop loving, because GOD IS LOVE.

Once they realize their mistake and begin to experience doubts, they find the cost of leaving too high, so they repress doubts, which becomes more and more distorting to their lives year after year, causing Witnesses to have among the highest levels of mental illness and family dischord of any social subgroup in society.

> Jehovah witnesses do not have a rule saying your are not
> allowed to speak to family members that are not Jehovah
> witnesses.

This tactic is called "plausible deniability". The Witnesses have many unwritten rules because they know they would lose credibility and be legally liable if all the rules were clearly written. So they do not write down what they really mean, and what they do write is logically and linguistically so convoluted that even the most reasonable and educated person will eventually throw up his hands and give up trying to understand it, typically saying to himself, "Well someone at headquarters must understand, so I'll just trust they know what they're talking about and go along with it", which is exactly the response the leadership was counting on. This is one of the deceptive tactics used to make people give up thinking for themselves. Occam's razor teaches that something unnecessarily complex is false, which holds true in this case, but most Witnesses never see through the deception, or if they do they pretend they do not because the cost of leaving is too high.

What Jehovah's Witnesses do teach is a misapplication of 1 Corinthians 15:33. They repeat again and again to their members that "bad associations spoil useful habits" and apply this scripture to even close relatives who are not Witnesses, and imply that an "association" is a person, when linguistically it is actually an event. The lesson which is repeated time and again is that certain persons who can be judged as "bad" (a logical non sequitur since only God can judge persons as "bad" as per Witness teaching) will spoil your useful habits. Then through implication it is further taught that without your "useful habits" you become an enemy of God, and therefore Witnesses cannot afford to enjoy the company of non-Witness relatives without risking their eternal lives.

Implications and unwritten rules are the meat and potatoes of Witness teaching. They do not clearly write down any of their controversial rules such as shunning family members, because they wish to preserve their later opportunities for "plausible deniability". This is a very deceptive behavior. Those who tell lies (even for what they feel is good cause) cannot represent the God of Truth.

> our leader is Jehovah

No, your leader is the Watchtower Society. If God whispers in the ear of one of your members in answer to a prayer, and that member follows God's instruction, he will be punished by your people for preferring God Himself to the Watchtower. If one of your members explicitly follows something written in the bible because he believes the bible to be the direct word of God, but doing so is not consistent with Watchtower literature (as it often is not), that person is punished by your organization for preferring the Bible to the Watchtower. Your leader is the Watchtower Society, and the network of agents it appoints, including District Overseers, Circuit Overseers and local congregational elders. Their word is law among you, not the Bible. They play the Bible like a fiddle to say anything they personally want it to say, often for their own personal advantage.

> we teach exactly what the bible teaches.

And a lot more. The bible does not teach cult mind control.

And a lot less. The bible teaches God is Love, yet your congregations practice only conditional "love" which is phony.

> here's a question for you, do you know of any religion
> that is in every country in the WHOLE ENTIRE WORLD?
> Jehovah's Witnesses are.

Here's a question for you: Is this evidence that you are "the one true religion"?

If Jehovah's Witnesses are "the one true religion" because they are now supposedly found in every country of the world, were they false in the past when found in only a few countries? Did they gradually become "truer" as more countries were added? Did they turn from false to true when the last country was added?  

How many countries you are found in is one of your many points of pride in your organizational "mother", as Watchtower literature proudly refers to the organization. It has no bearing on whether you use deceptive tactics.

> you should really get to know Jehovah's Witnesses and
> there religion before becoming a critic when you have no
> idea what we are like and what our religion is really
> about.

I was a JW for 30 years, then participated in active recovery for 10 years. That contrast has taught me many things that I did not know while I was still a Witness, things that you do not yet know because you have not yet even begun your recovery from your deceptive path.

May the God of Truth forgive you for your blindness and for repeating the lies of an organization that only seeks to control people, albeit "for their own good". Manipulating people through complex web of deception is the greatest offense to everything holy in the universe, because the universe is founded on the principle of free choice.

Outraged at your continued deception,
AndrewXJW