Why leave the Org?

Contributed by GTR38 at Reddit.

“Before joining this sub-reddit, I always thought that EXJWs were people who just couldn’t live by the rules. People who wanted to live an immoral life full of promiscuity and drug use. People who were disfellowshipped and couldn’t clean up their life to come back. Never before had I heard of disassociation. Never before could I imagine people who are in perfectly “good standing” leaving the organization by their own will.

Yet, here I am writing to you today, still appointed as a Ministerial Servant (planning to step down ASAP) and still in good standing. I have given a couple Sunday public talks both of which everyone loved. Were it not for me waking up, I would have started giving public talks outside of my congregation and eventually, I would be groomed to be an elder. I have never been disfellowshipped and though I make my fair share of mistakes, I have not done anything that would be grounds for disfellowshipping. Furthermore, my choice to “fade” puts me at risk for loosing a large majority of my friends who are JWs. So the question is: Why would someone like me leave?

Everyone has their own reasons, some are more personal than others (such as a change in beliefs or being offended by another JW). However, there are many reasons to leave which are more universal. Here is a list of just some of the reasons why a witness in good standing might get fed up and leave:

–Being in the drivers seat of your own life: Even as an adult, life as a witness is like being in the passenger seat of your own car. This makes it very difficult to steer your life in the direction that makes you happy and brings you fulfillment. As a witness, the governing body has an immense amount of influence over: what you do with your free time, what entertainment you can enjoy, who your allowed to marry and what healthcare options are right for you, among many other things. While they may not have physical control over your actions, they do manipulate you through various means to make sure you follow direction. The most major form of this manipulation is the threat of getting disfellowshipped and being cut off from all of your friends and family. As an adult, you should be able to take your life in the direction that brings you happiness without worrying about getting backlash from others or being shunned.

Every assembly and convention we are reminded of what our life goals should be and what we should be doing on our evenings and days off. One of the biggest benefits of waking up is that your life becomes yours to control again. If you want to sleep in on the weekend, go to college, buy a car that is not “service appropriate” or watch a Harry Potter movie, its all up to you. No more worrying about the police like elder body reprimanding you for making choices that are well within your rights. As an adult, going to meetings and knocking on doors should be something you do because you genuinely want to, not because its a requirement. Life as a witness takes up so much free time and has so many requirements and rules that it can become hard to really get to know yourself and set aside time to explore and learn the things that really interest you.

–Hidden secrets: This is another big one. The organization sells itself as a very squeaky clean religion that is far better than any other “false” religion. However, behind the scenes, things are much different. The organization was once part of the big bad UN as an NGO. They have investments in companies that produce weapons and machines for war. They brag about growth and yet Kingdom Halls all over the world are bing closed and sold off. The year 1914 which is key to a lot of JW beliefs is un biblical and the real truth behind that date has ties to Pyramidology. There have been many cases of misquotes and plagiarism in the magazines and books. When it comes to policy, the “2 Witness Rule” is causing all sorts of legal issues and bad press for the organization. Most recently, there has been a $66 Million dollar class action suit in Canada and a $4000 a day penalty in California over the organizations piss-poor policy about sexual child abuse cases. There is simply too much to list and I encourage anyone who hasn’t already to take a look at: jwfacts.com

All of these secrets and many more have been hidden from the average witness. Furthermore, making any effort to find these secrets is heavily frowned upon and could get you disfellowshipped for apostasy. Another secret that many witnesses don’t know (especially witnesses 30 and younger) is the existence of a guy named Ray Franz who was a governing body member who left the organization. You should ask yourself: why would a governing body member leave and why would that be hidden? All of these secrets should really make you wonder if this religion really is the truth and if they really have gods backing…

-Fear of man: As witnesses, we were often told to have a healthy fear of God. However, in reality, most witnesses have a much stronger fear of man. When the R rated Wolverine movie (Logan) came out, me and a witness friend went to go see it in theaters. I was already waking up by then so the rating didn’t bother me. However, I noticed that the friend I went with was far more worried about a fellow witness seeing him go into the theater than he was about God watching him… This is very common among witnesses. Everything is about appearance. Just like a child fears being put in timeout, full grown adult witnesses fear being dragged into the “back room” and getting a talking to by the elders. As an adult, as long as what your doing is legal, you should not have to worry about elders or anyone else keeping tabs on you.

–Constant guilt: Guilt is one of the many emotions we can feel that can ruin our happiness. As a witness, the feeling of guilt is something that is near constant. If you’ve had a long hard day at work and don’t feel like going to the mid week meeting, you are trained to feel guilty for it. The same can be said for sleeping in on a Saturday morning. Guilt can also come from failing to turn the channel when the show your watching has a scene that is too sexual or playing a violent game, or forgetting to study for meeting. As if thats not already bad enough, as a witness, you can sometimes feel guilt even when you are doing things for the organization. Perhaps you stumbled over your presentation and the householder didn’t take the magazine, maybe you did not track your time well and your not sure how many hours to turn in or maybe you just came back from an assembly and watched as people your age go on stage and tell about everything they are doing for the organization and you think to yourself that you are not doing enough.

At the end of the day, no one is perfect. As a human, guilt is something we should feel when we do something wrong and it should push us to right our wrongs and help us to make better choices in the future. However, as a witness, guilt is something that you are made to feel near constantly for every little thing. It makes it near impossible to loosen up and actually enjoy your life.

–Form your own opinions on God, Spirituality and human origins: As a witness, you are not allowed to have or share your own opinions about spirituality, the Bible or God. You are TOLD what to believe with no wiggle room. The average witness thinks that he/she has studied the Bible but in reality, the studying has already been done for them. However, once you leave, you are free to form your own opinions and do your own research on this vast and mysterious subject. In the end, some EXJWs decide to take an atheist or agnostic route. Other EXJWs still believe most of what they learned as JWs. For me, I have decided to reject organized religion but spiritually I still align myself with a Christian like point of view. Although my freedom of being awake has allowed me to also accept some aspects from alternative spiritual beliefs and even some evolution mixed in. I truly have an open mind which is something I was not allowed to have as a witness. At the end of the day, the Bible was not made to start religions… it was man that did that. You should be able to find your own truth and follow the path that makes you the most happy. No one has the right to say that one belief is the only truth.

This also means you can form your own opinions about blood transfusions, birthdays and other things that were forbidden as a JW. When it comes to blood transfusions specifically, it is very easy to see that the Bible’s rule on abstaining from blood was really talking about ingesting blood as they do in some Asian and African cultures. However, like many JW rules, the governing body has stretched what the Bible says in order to create more rules. No where in the Bible does it say or even imply that blood transfusions, birthdays or even voting is bad. These are all based on mans interpretation and their imperfect interpretation has been pushed on JWs worldwide with room for debate.

-Have a more positive view of the world: As a witness, your end goal is to get to Armageddon so you can get to paradise. Unfortunately, this also means that you look forward to seeing the world crumble. When North Korea was shooting off test missiles, you may have been slightly afraid but more than likely, you were glad since this “must mean that the end is near”. A rising crime rate, global warming, bad economy, war and drastic changes in politics are all things that make witnesses excited. But from the outside looking in, this is a very depressing and twisted way to view the world around you. In the world of super heroes, people who get happiness from seeing the world crumble around them are called villains…

–Freedom to achieve your true potential: No matter what you believe happens after death, we can all agree that life is far too short. The best we can do is make sure we use our limited time to have the most fulfilling life possible. For each person, that fulfillment is different. It could be gaining material riches, having a large happy family, traveling the world, helping those in need or building a business. Whatever it is, we all have the right to chase after our dreams so we can feel as little regret as possible when our time is up. However, as a witness, your chance to achieve your dreams and reach your full potential is limited. A witness high school senior who has record breaking test scores and a guaranteed scholarship to M.I.T. will be heavily encouraged and trained to refuse the scholarship so he/she can focus on spiritual matters. A child who has always loved animals and dreams of traveling the world as a vet to help all the exotic animals who are facing extension will be discouraged from chasing that dream. A kid with an entrepreneurial spirit will be encouraged to use those skills for ministry instead of making what could be the next big business that changes the world.

There are so many opportunities out there that are just waiting to be grabbed. But as a witness, the only accepted big dreams are those that are approved by the organization such as being a special pioneer, working at Bethel or becoming a Circuit Overseer. For everyone else, you are expected to live a simple life, not seek higher education and spend as much of your free time as possible doing things for the religion. Even if you have the potential of a Bugatti Chiron, the Watchtower Organization will make sure that you only stay in 1st gear…

There are so many more reasons but it would be too long to list. The main point is that everyone has a right to live the happiest life possible. Its certainly possible to be happy as a JW but that is heavily dependent on your families status within the organization and your personality. For the vast majority of us, being a witness is like carrying extra weight. We leave so we can be free, be happy and be in charge of our lives. Leaving is NOT a license to be an asshole. Nor does leaving mean that a person wants to dive head first into an immoral life. In fact as a PIMO, my life is every bit as moral as it was when I was fully in. Leaving is all about what I mentioned in my first point: Getting out of the passenger seat and into the drivers seat of the car that is your life.

Sorry for the long post. Hopefully this will help some of you lurkers understand a few reasons why people in good standing leave.”