Moved to a new neighborhood a couple of months ago, and one day my spouse accidentally answered the door to some Jehovah homies. Now the homies (wittled down to a singular, stubborn おばちゃん) rings my doorbell every Monday to try to join the squad.
We’ve been ignoring her, and not answering the intercom. But it’s been a month now, and I’m tired of her pestering us.
What are some good (and bad) ways to get her to stop bothering us? I’m thinking the next time she rings, I’ll just answer in English to spook her.
41 comments
Be Clear and Firm next time. Be politely but firmly and tell them that you are not interested in engaging in religious discussions or receiving further visits. Respect their beliefs but request to be left alone.
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Display a Sign: Consider putting up a sign on your door or intercom stating that you are not interested in religious or solicitation visits. Ask someone to translate it in Japanese for you.
Disfellowshipped.
“We’re not interested. Please remove us from your list.” Not too complicated.
Put a sign at the door saying that you don’t accept visits from religious organisations and that someone from a religious organisation ringing the bell constitutes harassment. Repeated harassment will be reported to the police.
Next level is printing out large pictures of the harassers in action and attaching them to them to the door as part of the sign.
I told them my best friend from back home is JW so I’ll ask her if I have any questions about it and they never bothered me again.
In my case it’s true but of course you can just lie.
I suggest be polite but firm and tell them you are not interested. I suppose you could tell them to remove them from thier list.
My wife grew up in JW in Japan. It was hard on her. She didn’t want to go around to all of the houses and she had to do it in H.S. I can only imagine how that must have been for her. Try to have a heart, and just be clear and firm, not mean even it if is a bit of an intrusive system.
Just talk to them like human beings.
Tell them you’re a Satanist, or Muslim. Idk why but they run super fast when they hear this 🤷🏻♀️
Laugh like a maniac and slowly close the door
Holy shit, for the first time in my 7 years here I had somone try to share the good news with me today and then I come across this post. Crazy.
Tell them to stop coming.
If they come after that, tell them you will call the cops on them.
I remember many eons ago opening my Leopalace door to a JW gentleman, he gave me a look and let out this laugh/sigh. I’m ethnically Bengali. We talked a couple of minutes (my Japanese was terrible at the time), in which I disclosed I was Muslim, he was like ‘cool’, and went on his way. Never came back.
Which is a long winded way of saying, just tell them you’re not interested for whatever reason (but do give them a reason so they don’t come back).
For me as a Japanese language student, when religious groups come to my door, it’s a free 30 minute conversation practice. When it gets too deep, I just politely tell them I have to go.
If you or your spouse would politely tell her that you’re not interested and say you’d appreciate it if she didn’t ring again, it’s almost certain she’ll respect your wishes. We’ve had some experience with JW, and they’ve always stopped coming by when we asked. By the way, I have heard that a good number of JW in Japan speak English well.
I just told them もう来ないでください and shut the door. Didn’t see them since.
Answering in English might spook her once, but they’re like sand people. They’ll soon be back, and in greater numbers. The next time they’ll show up with someone who speaks English. Speaking from experience here. End result, it won’t stop them from bothering you.
T.H. White, author (perhaps most known for The Once and Future King) was a large man, with wild white hair and a full beard. They knocked on his door once, he said “I’m Jehovah, how are we doing?” Apparently they ran, your mileage may vary. Probably worth trying some of the other suggestions here, though.
Flamethrower
Begin the short circuit process by telling them you’d like to hear more but they can’t use any Watchtower material.
You could recruit them to your own religion. Just make one up and try to get followers. I mean, they already proved they are easily persuaded…
No one ever comes to our door unannounced, with the exception of our sons’ friends or a delivery. These days I find it easy to avoid these religious shysters and the NHK twats, as well. Many years ago they had a habit of coming when I was severely hung over and it led to several unpleasant encounters.
“I’m a former member” gets you instantly blacklisted.
Saying you are a Satanist or Christian or Atheist just motivates them to come even more often to “save you”.
“Sorry, we’re **Pastafarian**”
Try to convert them to convert them to your religion. Then they will know what it feels like.
> I’ll just answer in English to spook her.
lol, as if that would be enough. She’ll just return with English speakers and with a fistful of English pamphlets to give you.
If you want to F with them, have your own fistful of The Satanic Temple information to give to them in return. Order a membership card and a tshirt from their website. Wear the shirt and show them your membership card. Study up a bit. Start quoting the tenets to them. TST is pretty cool. Guarantee you will never have another JW knocking at your door.
Or just tell them your entire family was disfellowshipped “back home”. Will have the same effect but it’s a whole lot less fun.
I told them I am Catholic and listened to what they had to say. Got those cards they were giving it and told them I will look into it when I have the time. They left and never came back.
They’re keep coming because now they think you are friendly and open to conversation.
Put “no soliciting” stickers near the door bell and on your door. I was told by some neighbors that “no soliciting” stickers are rude, antisocial, but I no longer have any issues with religious groups, scammers etc.
Stickers for doors look like this:
https://preview.redd.it/mq0benvc2hfb1.jpeg?width=294&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=31b53187c224b47e734f6cae2978c1606761dd28
“I’m catholic” usually does the trick.
The have come to my door only once in Japan. It was early on a Sunday morning and I think I got home at 5am or something, when there was a knock at the door I sprang up and ran to it without even thinking. I was still drunk so by the time I realised where I was, I already had the door open and 3 Japanese people blinking at me.
“Hello, we are Jevohas witness. Do you speak Japanese?”
(say no say no say no say no)
“…. …. …. no?”
“Ah, so…” gets ready with pamphlet.
“No thank you, bye bye.”
I shut the door then realise I’m wearing what Peter Alexander’s calls the ‘slinky nightie’.
They never came back.
Do what I did – easy – I told them I’m a Mormon missionary and they left me alone after that (of course need to have that look)
Not sure if this would work in Japan, but we had Jehovas witnesses coming around our place a lot in the US. They were always big on offering to “help out” to talk to you about religion.
What we found is taking them up on their offer to do some manual labor, dig ditches, work on cars, etc. really got them to leave quickly and stop coming around at all.
Anything that got their nice clothes really dirty.
I grew up as a JW. The full proof ways to be removed from their knocking list is to be an apostate or to be disfellowshipped.
Next time they knock, say you used to be JW’s but no longer aren’t and are disfellowshipped. This should work, but there is still a small chance an elder from that woman’s congregation might try to contact you as they are instructed to be aware of any disfellowshipped people in the area in order to be able to invite you to conventions and to the memorial.
If this happens go the apostate route.
My friend has a cute black cat. Very stereotypically he called the cat Lucifer. When the Jehovas knocked on the door, he answered and tried to decline very nicely. They were a bit persistent till the point the cat ran out to the corridor.
My friend just leaped after the cat screaming ” Lucifer, come back”.
The Jehovas had the weirdest face and they never returned.
(This happened in the UK)
My wife is an ex JW and had to go do the door to door BS too. She hated it. Please be kind. She told me that you can say, “The spirit is not with us.” For a JW, that’s basically a “don’t come back because I won’t join your religion and you are wasting your time.”
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My mother in law is still a JW and she affirmed this. If people tell her “The spirit is not with us / me” her congregation checks their home off the list of places they’re willing to go to.
A bucket of cold water
Flip it around on them and ask if they have time to hear about your Lord and savior Satan.
I’m not interested in religion. I have told you many times, if you come again I will call the police.
Many many years ago, I dated a member of their flock. I pointed out the error of their ways, and convinced her that their beliefs were incorrect, and incompatible with human kindness. She ceased her association with the organization, which caused them to leave me alone as well, lest I increase my sphere of influence.
They *still* cross over to the other side of the road when they see me coming. Their rumour mill is strong. It seemed like a significant investment of effort at the time, but the dividends it’s paid have been boundless.
Long story short, just invest in a time machine and deprogram a young JW. They will leave you alone forever after.
Tell them you’re a committed blood donor. That saw them off for me.
My father actually died of Leukemia but life was prolonged and bearable, thanks to blood donations.. They normally don’t have an answer for that.
Pests.
First time I shooed then with no Japanese, second time they brought a French guy. I’m impressed by their persistence for my salvation
“Does your cult have orgies as well?”
Answer the door with your knob out
I had the bright idea when Jehovah Witnesses came to my house I would be overly polite and waste as much as their time as possible. Reverse Uno. I would only speak in English to them too. It was Sunday and had no where to be.
Basically I would talk with them until they got bored and left. Ended up talking to this old Japanese couple and the husband knew some English, for over an hour we talked until they excused themselves and left.
Thought that would get rid of them and they wouldn’t be back. They came a few weeks later and figured alright I got nothing to do today again and will let them stay at my door as long as they want, till they get bored and leave. I also decided to talk about and ask questions outside of religion, like what’s their jobs and basically invade their privacy too.
The old Japanese couple ended up staying over an hour again at my doorstep and learned the husband worked at the zoo and took care of the animals there.
They left again. This would repeat every few weeks for a couple months, and eventually it ended up just the husband coming and figured out he wanted to practice his English. He was actually knowledgeable about religion and philosophy, and he would talk about it for about 5 or 10 minutes and then move in to other topics in English like the news, politics, film, art and drawing, the environment, the animals and how they were doing at the zoo. (Loved hearing about the animals at the zoo and the drama that goes on in animal lives)
In the strangest of ways we actually became friends and every few Sundays my doorbell would ring and would look forward to speaking to him about his life, and mine.
We did this for over 2 and a half years. Eventually I got a new job and had to move and was super glad he came a week before I left and got to tell him good bye and we were both actually sad about it. He was super grateful that I spoke English with him every few Sundays and said it really helped him improve his English. He actually came back a few days later and gave me a nice looking Bible as a thank you.
Still have it and every time I see it think of him, and the animals at the zoo, and hope he is doing well.