Just for the record - would this child rapist have been discovered if the congregation had obeyed the law for registration of people in churches who work with children? Or, was this the first set of incidents on his record?
Victoria, Australia: The long edition (new) of Part 2 of Steven Unthank's report of molestation/rape within the Traralgon Cong.
by AndersonsInfo 79 Replies latest watchtower child-abuse
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stuckinamovement
These poor children. I hope that the media picks up on this story. Witnesses love to say how they are nothing like the Catholics. Wrong! there is no difference between the religions when it comes to this problem.
SIAM
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Land of Magog
BTTT
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Violia
btt
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life is to short
btt
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ziddina
"Why would Steven Unthank be the one to report these alleged rapes and not the parents and are the parents prepared to back up the claims? ..." Listener
"If my child was abused I would need to be held back from beating the sh$% out of the abuser. I would certainly go to the police. What's wrong with these people? ..." Shepherd
They have been cowed into submission by years - even decades - of exhortations to obey obey obey the Governing Body...
Also, the very real threat of disfellowshipment and shunning silences far too many Jehovah's Witnesses with knowledge of such crimes...
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ziddina
"With all due respect, it is your job to protect those children, if God's spirit isn't motivitating His own Organization to do it ... don't you find something wrong with that? "God's Organization". Perhaps you should consider whether or not "the religion of their birth" is an appropriate reason to continue teaching them subjection to said religion. ..." Wanna Be Free
To use a viewpoint from Wanna Be Free's comment...
Phizzy, one reason so many young victims are so vulnerable is that they are TAUGHT TO BE OBEDIENT - to men, to elders, to the Watchtower Corporation.
The absolute level of obedience demanded of the followers makes this organization very dangerous to its followers...
I clearly recall a case of rape that occurred in the congregation I was in as a child - the Montview congregation of Aurora, Colorado.
This would have happened around 1966 - 1968, I think... Definitely before I reached adulthood.
A VERY young teen was disfellowshipped for not resisting enough when she was raped. I think that she was 13 years old...
I was upset by the thought that this young teen was being thrown out of the cult - er, "truth" - and spoke to a very trusted elder about it - this man was like a second - better - father to me.
His response to my comment that she was unable to fight back because the man was so strong??
He took a piece of paper, punched a hole in it, had me hold a pencil over it, and started wiggling the paper around under the pencil, making the hole supposedly difficult to hit... He then spoke very disparagingly of the idea that she couldn't fight back.
I remember thinking very clearly at the time, however, that it would have been very easy for a man to rape a JW girl because of the way submissive behavior was thoroughly and constantly being hammered into the ears and minds of JW females. It would take nothing for a clever man to use that "submissive" tack to psychologically 'disarm' a JW female and reduce or eliminate resistance.
I didn't bother mentioning this to that elder. I could see that he'd already made up his mind, and I wasn't going to subject myself to his scorn again.
I never again viewed him as my favorite elder from that day on...
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smiddy
Good points Zid
smiddy
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Retrovirus
Another approach - here in Victoria, could we encourage householders to ask jws at the door if they could show their "Working with Children" cards? At the very least it would put a hole in that polite but superior sales image
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ShadesofGrey
Very good idea retro.