Handling social calls such as JW's

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I apparently don't handle social calls well. Having a panic attack from a couple of Jehovah Witnesses who came to the door, I ended up freaking out on them and I'm still shaking and feel like throwing up. How do you handle this? They kept talking to me even after I told them they should leave!

That's a shame. They should have gone away when you asked. Ironicaly, if the person you were talking to was autistic they might not have taken the hint. Jws can be autistic too.

Personally I would write to your local church and explain that you suffer from social anxiety and can't cope with such calls. Not sure what will happen, but at least you can explain yourself. I wonder if anyone will write back.

Even telling them not to come back doesn't always work. We've told them when they've come to my household to go away and they still keep coming back.

I just say "Not interested, we're Catholic" and shut the door in their face.

Here, use quotes from this in your letter so they know what you're talking about when you mention autism. They can't really argue with something they've published themselves.

http://wol.jw.org/en/wol/d/r1/lp-e/102008329?q=asperger&p=par


And this is why they keep coming back:
http://www.jw.org/en/jehovahs-witnesses/faq/own-religion/

You handled it fine by asking them to leave. If they don't leave when you ask them to, they are in the wrong. If that ever happens again, threaten to call the police. And you can put a "No Solicitors" sign on your door to deter them from even knocking in the first place.

Don't ever let them in the door. I wouldn't even open my door if I know that's who they are. Ask through the door who they are and what they want

JWs (or anyone else who comes around to proselytize like that) are not going to act like normal people. You can pretty much throw out the normal social rules of politeness, because they are playing by their own rules. When they come around, it is absolutely NOT a "social call." They are there purely to recruit you into their cult. They are brainwashed and tranced out, and they can be highly manipulative. They will say or do anything they can to hook you into their belief system. If you are even a little bit polite to them, they will exploit that as long as possible.

Even if totally disagree with their ideas, and you know you would never buy into their religion, their behavior can still be overwhelming to the point that it makes you panic. I think your reaction was normal.

Last time they came around to my house I happened to be in the middle of cooking dinner. I opened the door thinking it was probably my dad, and instead there was this older couple standing there with big nutty smiles on their faces. The minute they opened their mouths I knew it had to be some religious thing. When I looked them over and saw the religious tracts in the man's pocket I didn't waste any time. I said, "Sorry I'm busy" and slammed the door shut. If I hadn't actually been busy doing something it probably wouldn't have occurred to me to say that.

If it was not someone I know or a delivery person I was expecting or whatever, I simply wouldn't answer the door. I mean it could be home invaders pretending to be JW for all I would know. As far as dealing with them, they are trained like sales people not to take no or go away for an answer. I think most of them are probably brainwashed, so of course that's what they're going to try on you. Just don't answer the door.

Shut the door. Problem solved.

Many times I will ignore the door if it someone I don't know. I told the JW who came to my door once that I was a Methodist church organist (which is true), and they haven't come back.

I would like to relate something that happened to me which I have laughed at many times after. My wife and I had just purchased brand new carpeting. It had just been laid when a vacuum salesman came to our door and asked to demonstrate his amazing marvel of cleaning technology. Normally I would have said, "not interested," but I couldn't resist the opportunity before me. I said, "come in, I'd love to see it." He asked to see our vacuum. It was a K-mart purchased Hoover. He said we would be amazed by how much dirt our Hoover wasn't picking up that his would. He put tissue paper on his nozzle to demonstrate the amount of dirt he would pull out of the carpet. And try as hard as he could, not one particle of dirt was on his tissue paper. He scratched his head in disbelief and left.

With vacuum sales demonstrations, I would like to add something. The demonstration often involves placing tissue paper over the nozzle to show the amount of dirt in one's carpet. After they do this, ask for a piece of the tissue paper and put it on your own vacuum. Then run over where they ran their amazing machine. I bet you pick up dirt where their vacuum ran.

With JW or other frequent house visitors, I guess one could open the door and just stand there in the threshold saying nothing and not moving, appearing like a statue. I wonder what they would do?

I have standard responses to folks that knock my door, depending on what they are selling/asking for, the usual one is answer door with phone, look or glare at them, say nothing, let them start their spiel, interrupt after 30 seconds and tell them I?m not interested and busy, close door. I?m in my house if I wanted to buy/donate something I would go to an establishment or website thank you.

Last edited by Amity on 28 Oct 2014, 8:28 am, edited 1 time in total.

That's not a very nice generalisation and laughably over the top. They're just normal people like everyone else. When you are polite to them they think that you are basically being polite to them and just want to talk. They aren't mind readers. If you want them to go away. You have to tell them, no thank you, but I'm not interested anymore. Don't make me one of your regular calls. Stop bringing me magazines. No I don't want to study the bible.

It's funny how people don't actually understand that JWs don't expect the people who talk to them to convert. They feel that they are successful if they have had a conversation with someone and explained a little about what they believe or have answered a question someone has. Granted they are all individuals so the way one acts won't be the way another one acts, but they are not actually dangerous LOL. They're just regular joes trying to explain what they believe. That's it.

Alot of them are kind of shy and awkward and it's nerve racking approaching a stranger and trying to start a conversation with them, so rather unsurprisingly their nerves can take over and maybe they'll waffle a bit and seem a bit awkward and not really take a hint.

this statement really made me laugh. Honestly, there's not a thing you can do to change a person's mind if they don't want to change it themselves. They don't offer people cake and then take them round the back of the house and waterboard them.

And it's always easy to demonize someone who is different by calling them "brainwashed" but just because you don't agree with the way someone sees things doesn't mean that the other person hasn't spent time reasoning on the subject and coming to a conclusion logically and thoughtfully. Just because someone doesn't see things the way you do doesn't mean that they are brainwashed.

You might want to reread the OP, because you seem to have missed the point. They don't go away just because you ask them to. They view this as a challenge to prove their faith.

In some Kingdom Halls it is actually considered a sign of great faithfulness if the witness gets thrown in jail for the sake of witnessing (e.g., for not leaving someone's home or property when they are asked to). They look at this as showing their devotion and faithfulness in the midst of adversity. This does make them potentially dangerous.



I would say you are a cult apologist, but you obviously don't know much about how this group actually operates. Here's a good place to start learning (from an ex-JW who was a member for 43 years):

http://www.watchtowerdocuments.com/advo ... esses.html

You might also want to read up on the extensive child abuse and pedophilia going on in the JW cult. I'm not going to link any of those stories because they may be upsetting or triggering to some people here.

One option: Do not open the door and say " You are trespassing on private property" and leave the door closed and walk away.

Actually, the best answer is don't open the door. I've just realised that my write a letter and send a formal request for no visits to your house is probably a bit too much for someone with social anxiety to deal with and not an appropriate suggestion from me.

No, Dianthus, I'm not ignoring the OP, I thought you meant that you were nice to Jehovah's Witnesses once and they came back to talk to you the next week thinking that you wanted to have further discussions and then came back the next week, then the next thinking you were interested in learning more, but had misunderstood that you were only being polite and you were like, "why have you come back?" In that circumstance it is better to make it clear that you didn't actually mean for them to have regular discussions or don't want them to bring you magazines every time a new edition comes out. I think there are some folk out there who are too polite to actually just say, ok this is enough and get exasperated because they expect the JWs calling on them to have sussed from their body language what they mean.

I'm not a cult apologist I'm a bleeding hearts liberal, get it right.

Showing me that link is a bit like someone telling me to go to ASpartners to see what terrible people Aspies and Autistics are. You do see that don't you? In every group of people there will be those who have had bad experiences. The internet is absolutely rife with scaremongering about this type of organisation and that one. I genuinely think it is better to talk to people from a particular group to find out what they actually do think.

Anyway, I do have a couple of relatives who are Jehovah's Witnesses and they are both shy and quiet people who couldn't convert a butterfly if they tried. Mind you, one is an aspie and her beliefs are her special interest so she does talk about it A LOT. I do know that after the BBC panorama program a few years back that interviewed a couple of women who had suffered child abuse whose cases were dealt with really badly by their local congregations because those cases were handled so badly a letter was read out to all congregations of JWs telling them that in such cases they should go to the police and child abuse is not something that will be tolerated. I know of a similar case and when the perpetrator was found out (who is now in jail btw) everyone that knew him in his old congregation is extremely angry with him, hurt and embarassed by his behaviour. That was years ago, but that hurt and anger toward the perpetrator is still strong. I can assure you that child abuse is something that they do not condone. And I doubt it is "extensive". You'll find bad people lurking in the corners of all sorts of organisations. I don't think JWs have mastered the secret of bad person repellant, so are not immune. But on the whole they are not bad people.

I think that if people just say, "I'm not interested," then it's logical to ask, what are you not interested in? or just quickly explain why you're there because the person might not really understand why you're there in the first place. But I think it is very rare for a JW to ignore a person saying, "please leave now," or "go away" they're not kamikaze conversationalist. If someone is staunchyly irate, who wants to talk to someone like that? They'll go away if you are firm and direct. You don't need to be rude, just firm and clear.

I don't think anyone really wants to go to jail to prove their faith, but if you feel strongly about something and you believe in freedom of speech then you will defend it even if it means going to prison - that's the liberal in me coming out again.

You and I are different kinds of people I think. I am Polyanna and I try and look for the good. If you always look for the negative you will always find it.

If unwanted solicitations come by phone, once I realize it, I stop talking and hang up.

If they come in person, once I figure out who/what they are I just say 'I am not interested, have a good day.' and close the door or walk away, etc.

If you get them frequently at home, a 'No solicitations' sign might help.

I have no idea how you got that from my post. I didn't say anything remotely like that. You must have awful reading comprehension.

Best thing to do with JW's, if you're not interested in becoming one, is to NOT OPEN THE DOOR.

Once you speak to them, you're going to be looking at The Watchtower for a while. That's just, you know, what they do.

Like any other organization, some of them are OK, and some of them aren't. Some of them are manipulative and abusive, and some of them are just so enthusiastic (or so used to being shoved out the door with excuses) that they're deaf to, "I need you to leave now."

Don't feel bad for freaking out on them.

Frankly, I think MOST people would freak out after telling a stranger that they need to leave, only to be ignored.

If not, then I want to know why I hate to go to people's houses, and when I have to go, I don't enjoy the visit, because I'm constantly on the lookout for signs that it's time to leave.