The same thing happened here on the West Coast of Fla. I sent out a Baptism Nullification letter (check it out in the friends forum) to everyone I knew and had a hard time rounding up a lot of the Elders addresses. Turns out they are discouraged from listing them in the Telephone Book. As I was a de facto member of the servant body for 16 years I had a number of old lists. But the local groups are told not to put together phone lists anymore to "protect the privacy of the members". In this way a person who wants to share his or her feelings will have to go to the local brothers and this helps to contain any potential problems. Although many Elderets still put these lists together for gossip purposes. Maverick
WT Squelches Congrefational Address Lists
by Room 215 16 Replies latest jw experiences
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ozziepost
I understand that in the UK there is legislation which impacts upon these lists known as the Data Protection Act. Here in Australia we have the Privacy legislation and all organisations, including churches, have had to review their circulation of lists.
From what I've seen, the WTS may have used this to further "clamp down" on the R&F, in a state of paranoia as Roomie says, but it's interesting to see how churches have reacted to the legislation. Ones I've seen have continued with lists but only after advising their congregation members and inviting those who do not wish to be on a list to advise accordingly.
Cheers, Ozzie
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Farkel
: Lately in my area, however, requests for a current list were refused, with the explanation that it would be ``imprudent to keep such a list, as it would compromise the brothers' /sisters' identities were it to fall into the wrong hands.""
This is what dubs refer to as "Christian Freedom."
Farkel
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LDH
LOL @ this whole chain of thought.
This is how you separate the men from the boys. Back in the day, we were DEFIANT in this type of situation. Yeah, here's a God Damned list -- Jehovah's got my back--what you gonna do about it?!?!?!?
And now, the JWS are so watered down they have forgotten they are supposed to be a
THEATRICAL SPECTACLE TO THE WORLD.
They are not supposed to be intimidated by anyone or anything. LOL.
Lisa
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Pistoff
The real reason for banning lists has been touched on:
An "apostate" could then easily distribute FACTS that would "confuse" the faithful.
There is your reason, methinks.
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minimus
Please put me on a Do Not Call list.
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Stephanus
Ozzie, I was thinking along the same lines in this thread. We've recently been giving the option of opting out of the Church directory, because of the new legislation. My thought was that a clamping down was driving this phenomenon. But it seems it's another one of those things that depends on the congregation.