Insane, goofy story idea, complete with vampire-craziness

[matrixrefugee]

Or, why you should never watch a short independent film about Jehovah's Witnesses on PBS, in between episodes of the "Hellsing" anime.

My mom watched the JW doumentary the other night: pretty good and pretty neutral about JW-ism (the guy who filmed it was raised JW, but he's now an agnostic). Much of it dealt with a young man who'd grown up JW getting a liver transplant without a blood transfusion (and JWs, based on their slightly odd interpretation of a verse in Exodus, don't *do* transfusions); seems that there's a lot of research and experimental surgery being done to find a way to perform lengthy operations without giving the patient a transfusion, since there's been so many problems with contaminated donor blood. Plus, it would allow JWs to have their belief respected by medical professionals (however impractical it may seem to me or anyone else who thinks that way. Me, I'd rather have the transfusion, tankswerrimuch).

Which got me to thinking... what do you do if you're a JW who got cornered by a vampire that turned you? I suppose you'd be flat-out disfellowshipped, and/or your former brothers and sisters in faith would be either trying to find a cure for you or they'd be trying to stake you. I smell an idea for a novel or a short-story, but I'm concerned it might displease some JWs. Hell, why should I worry? How many of them read that kind of stuff anyway, I wonder?

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

My cousin, who's an aspiring graphic novelist, follows this credo: "Write what you want, let the lawyers sort it out afterwards". In her case she uses a lot of historical figures and settings, but puts them in fictional situations.
In your case, since it's a religiously-based thing, and especially since it's a religion that you *aren't*, I'd write what you want but tread carefully and do a LOT of research beforehand. I know I write characters that are not of my faith (Cal and Nicky being Catholic or Ilia being Jewish, just off the top of my head) and even if religion doesn't dictate their "lives", I still want to know as much as I can so I don't make some embarrassing error down the road.
~Ruby

[matrixrefugee.livejournal.com]

Hee, I've kind of done a lot of that research indirectly: My mom's cousin (well, one of them), became a JW in her twenties, so mom went a little nuts reading every book she could get her hands on/listening to/watching every tape/video she could find about it in an effort to understand it, so I absorbed a lot of the info by osmosis. Wouldn't kill me to do a refresher course, though if I *do* decide to go through with this wacky idea: I don't think anyone's thought of it before, and pretty much everything else has been done in the vampire genre...

NEARLY 500 JW Lawsuits & Court Cases Summarized

[(Anonymous)]

SUMMARIES OF NEARLY 500 JEHOVAH'S WITNESSES LAWSUITS & COURT CASES


The following website summarizes over 165 lawsuits filed by Jehovah's Witnesses against their Employers, and/or incidents involving problem JW Employees:

EMPLOYMENT ISSUES UNIQUE TO JEHOVAH'S WITNESS EMPLOYEES

http://jwemployees.bravehost.com


The following website summarizes 300 U.S. court cases and lawsuits affecting children of Jehovah's Witness Parents, including 100+ cases where the JW Parents refused to consent to life-saving blood transfusions for their children:

DIVORCE, BLOOD TRANSFUSIONS, AND OTHER LEGAL ISSUES AFFECTING CHILDREN OF JEHOVAH'S WITNESSES

http://jwdivorces.bravehost.com

Re: NEARLY 500 JW Lawsuits & Court Cases Summarized

[seanmcgee.myopenid.com (from livejournal.com)]

Dangit...I hate it when my fellow JW's embarass me like that. ATTN JW'S: IT DOESN"T LOOK GOOD WHEN YOU SPAM!