You Can't Be "You" and Be a Jehovah's Witness Too

At least, you can't have individuality and also follow the rules to a T. The thing is, being a "good Christian" per the description in their literature meant being prohibited from certain hobbies, hiding specific interests, and limiting your conversation to meet the standards of the weakest conscience in your presence. Do PG-13 romance movies get young Brother Puberty too excited? Turn on a G-rated Disney movie. Is the magic in the cartoon demonic in Sister Oldtimer's opinion? TV off, Bible games it is.

As I've said before, these anecdotes are not exaggerations. These are actual situations I was in, I just changed the names to protect their identity or whatever. Like here's another one. "Young Sister Not-an-Elder's-Daughter, I can't believe you used the word 'mug' in that manner! You do realize it's a euphemism for 'MFer', you might as well say the curse word! Talk about reproach on Jehovah's name!"

Ugh.

And the articles published by the organization specifically speak to the idea of not "stumbling" your brothers and sisters in the faith. It is a BIG no-no to be an imperfect human, possibly responsible for negatively impacting someone's relationship with an all-powerful heavenly being...that they've never seen or heard, but that can read their heart and truly cares about them!😬😶

Yes, it is as illogical as it sounds, thank you for noticing. But that's cognitive dissonance for you, and one of things that keep people in check. I mean, just imagine if poor Sister Sober came to your home for fellowship, but you had Bud Light in your fridge and that was the straw that broke the camel's back and lead her spiraling right out "the truth"... would you really want to aid Anheuser-Busch in making a fool of Jehovah God?

Yeah....spending a decade or two trying to make sure all your activities are as bland as possible, in order to not offend anyone is a clear path to being a Stepford Wife if I ever saw one. My girl @freebird_lo explained it perfectly the other day.

Dangerous. And harmful.

But, then if you were like me and unwilling to acquiesce at times and had a crowd of like-minded non-tattletellers to associate with, you were deemed as bad association and had to deal with a soft version of shunning from people who determined you weren't good enough, even while still technically part of their organization...let me just mention again how I don't miss it. I love being me. And by all means, You, please be you.