Replies to '08/24 The Family Cult'

I was raised a Jehovah's Witness also in the 60's from the age of two years old. I was not only "a good little JW girl" but I was loyal and faithful and believed with faith and conviction what I was taught.  

I had my share of playground incidents and some left me running in tears from the yard. But I see it as no different than  some other issue they would have teased me over on another day. And they did. I was a short , fat, red-head with freckles and a first name that had a popular rock song after it and a last name that Huckleberry hound made famous. I had  a good healthy dose of constant teasing in my life. The times it was over my religion were only a part of the whole.  

Being a Jehovah's Witness was nothing like being in this kind of atmosphere and had none of the all-encompassing factors that this group did/does. 

To compare the two is self-serving and diminishes the trauma of the members who have left this "Family" 

All religions have their frauds. You cannot  find a religion that does not have  some bad people in it because all religions have people in them and not all people behave well. I will not argue the level of offense the Witnesses may have  committed, but I will argue whole heartedly including them into the same mesh with this "Family". To say they are nearly comparable is to take away from the very real experiences these brave souls are sharing with us and  healing themselves from. 

That's just my take on it. 

(By the way? I left the Witnesses in  the late 70's of my own volition and have half my family still in it.) 

        I am not a Jehovah Witnesses, but my sister is.  To call the Jehovah Witnesses a cult is harsh.  A cult does not want it members to talk to there family's if the family does not beleave the way the cult does.  My sister is very close to me and the rest of owe family.  She is the only Jehovah Witnesses in the family.  Before she became a Jehovah Witnesses she was on drugs real bad.  Now she only lives for God and I dont see anything wrong with that.  Now about the enforced ritual shunning.  I dont know about your family but my sisters husbands family are Jehovah Witnesses and his sister stop being a Jehovah Witnesses when she came out the closet.  His family and the other Jehovah Witnesses have not shunned her.  To compare Jehovah Witnesses with "The Family" is just wrong.