There are many problems with the "arrangement" but the part that really bothers me is that the accused - who the secret elders' manual often calls "the wrongdoer" - is not allowed her own witnesses or support to be in the room with her.
Elders who conduct judicial comittees are creepy & perverted
by jambon1 49 Replies latest jw friends
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NewChapter
I'm sorry Viola. Words are so weak.
NC
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Violia
i know NC, the words I said can never convey what they did to me. It was 88 ( 17 yrs later) before finally got psychiatric help for this and so many things were just sequela of the rape. I at lest can now talk about it on an open board. I was so fearful I could not for many years. I still can't name names .
sometimes silence is all one can do, and offer support. somethings don't have appropriate words and there are no emoticons or for sorrow and despair.
years later regarding another matter an elder said we treat our girls and women like "china dolls" and men are always held responsible for everything. I think he was really having some issues regarding the sexual harassment laws. it really was pitting men against women.
china dolls, wow, never had that experience.
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Band on the Run
Ssince they stand apart and mock the world, where are these elders giong to gain savvy and a sense of both restraint and privacy boundaries? It quickly becomes lecherous. The Roman Catholics can call in their psychiatrists and police officers for help. My view is prob. distorted b/c the elders in my low end KH were barely literatre and worked menial jobs. Someone who is illiterate and does menial work can be extremely bright and savvy. Their chances of mixing with various strata and pick up emotional and social intelligence are very small.
Many US states permit nonlawyers to do low level judiciary work. There are soud ideas for the practice. The first being the Shakespearian comment that we will kill all the lawyers - to obtain justice for ourselves. They may have gut instincts that a lawyer has lost through acculuration to the legal field. The problem is these nonjudges are interpreting the law. They have no clue what they are doing. Simple conceptss elude them. And someone's life is being affected negatively.
Besides doctrine and even the cult, thie lack of love, empathy, and compassion within the JWs terrified me. Jesus' conduct was such a contrast. No NT figure was ever as intrusive as these men are. An admission of improper sexual conduct is stunning. A person is admitting behavior that is manifestly against their own interest. Evidence is considered more reliable if it is against the speaker's interests. The only reason details are important is to feed a pruirent interest on the part of the elders. Some, too, may simply not social mores for not intruding into sexual matters, esp. with no sympatheitc female present, to buffer the yuckiness. They feed on their limited power and don't acknowledge they have limits.
Jesus did not ask details. Maybe he had some god consciousness. I don't think so at all. Their interest should be to segregate notorious wrong doers from the congregation to protect the public image and to help the offender. Details don't matter. Everyone here knows the atmosphere that poisons these inquirers. It is the same atmosphere that infects the Witnesses as a whole. Feminist to JWs- GET OFF MY BODY. Christ is welcome. You are NOT Christ.
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designs
Viola,
You have all of our support, its beyond condemning what those elders did.
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Violia
Thank you so much.
The men involved , the congregation involved is a disgrace for even a jws congo. These are not illiterate folks either. ( several of them are businessmen , not janitors) They are just what we used to call hardliners . They were even known in the circuit as a df'ing congo. They are the folks living in the glass house . Somehow they have managed to continue on so any ideas I had that Jehovah's spirit really did direct things were dashed long ago.
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NewChapter
Last night I was thinking about this in relation to the thread on scriptural divorce. I generally don't think this way anymore because I no longer believe the bible has any authority. But if it DID, I tried to imagine a young woman in the first century sitting in front of 3 men detailing a sexual encounter. I can't prove this did not happen, but it seems very unlikely. If it had happened, you'd think it would be alluded to in some manner! Think how shocking such behavior would be for Jewish Christians.
Where does the bible say that the "accused" can't have someone present on their behalf? The rule is by 2 or 3 witnesses, but the "wrongdoer" isn't entitled to such a provision. They don't want you to discuss what happens, and if you are DF'd no one will listen anyway. Just imagine how the dynamic would change if the "wrongdoer" was allowed just one witness! They can't DF them both! That leaves one behind to talk.
The R&F would be disturbed if someone was left to talk. Right now the information is controlled and they simply assume the DF person would be a liar anyway. They are free to assume that things went well. Oh if only they could hear the whole story.
I met someone new recently. I had heard his story for some years because I associated with his old congregation and knew some of his family. Everyone assumed he was disfellowshipped for one particular thing and that he went off to persue a selfish lifestyle! He was rebellious. When I found out what he was REALLY df'd for I was just STUNNED. ANY JW would have been stunned. But they aren't allowed to know. The "selfish lifestyle--translation: pursuit of happiness" only came after this shocking DF. The DF itself made him see the fallacy and he was free to live as he liked.
One witness on his side would have made that evident to all. The org disgusts me. On the other hand he is free now so the outcome was good.
NC
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aSphereisnotaCircle
Violia, your story is heartbreaking. And just in case anyone out there does not believe you, or thinks that it is an isolated incident, I can verify that this is how the elders deal with rape.
A very close friend of mine was raped by four men, the elders wanted to know every last detail, in the end they disfellowshipped her for immorality. It did not matter that she was drugged and tied up. What mattered to them was that she had been drinking, she was at a worldly party and she had been DFed once previously for fornication. So to them she was asking for it.
That is how the elders treat rape victims, it is disgusting, they are assholes, everyone of them should have to endure being raped and then have to plead there innocence, alone, in front of a panel of judges.
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designs
aSphere-
You are correct. The last Congregation I was in the Elders traumatized a young Pioneer sister who had been raped to the point she developed full on adult Schizophrenia.
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carla
Violia I am so sorry for all you have endured! including the second rape by the jw elders.
My jw does not believe these things go on in dubland. I don't think he has a real clue about jc's. I don't know how to make him believe any of it. He says it may happen once and a while, human beings, blah, blah.... I tell him it happens more often than not re: anything sexual. The elders must be perverts to ask such questions, it is the only reason I can think of. Trying to add 'greed' to the fornication is just ridiculous. (I think that is the reason they give for wanting all the gory details)