Normally we have a formula. Disaster, cue WT volunteers to the rescue, self congratulatory breaking news on JW.Borg. Parts of Spain are washed out with huge loss of life. From WT Inc? Nothing.
What's Happening In Spain?
by Slidin Fast 7 Replies latest jw friends
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Sea Breeze
They are waiting for the insurance carriers to estimate the damages. Then the watchtower will come to the rescue with free labor and a final invoice for the restoration.
Remember, they bring food at the “proper time.”
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Slidin Fast
100's dead, huge carnage of highly populated areas, still radio silence.
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Journeyman
This happens a lot with the JW website. For all that it is trumpeted by the Org as being "up-to-date" and the only place where the R&F should look for "reliable" news, etc, they are extremely slow to post anything really relevant in world events that might be affecting congregations.
We see it often with the annual hurricane season in the USA, but it's good to see someone asking about something that is not US-centric too, as major events outside the US tend not to get as much coverage. It took several days from hurricanes striking until there was any info on the JW website about victims, relief efforts, etc. Their article on Helene is dated October 3rd and the one on Milton is dated October 17th, but the first reports of Helene were on "worldly" news channels from Sept 24-29, and for Milton around Oct 5-10.
I can imagine that for all the talk the Org does about responding rapidly to world events, while local elders and congregations may act swiftly (people are naturally more likely to have their neighbours' contact details and start searching for them immediately, and collecting water, blankets, etc), I suspect the time it takes to get info from local areas to the national branch, and then across to the HQ in NY, and then for them to decide what to publish, makes it a long and bureaucratic process.
That doesn't mean local help hasn't already started (other Spanish Witnesses travelling to help out, for example) but the Org itself is very slow to update the R&F in the rest of the world, despite their supposed care for the "worldwide association of brothers".Given that they believe these are "critical times" and they expect world events to get worse, you'd think they'd have a team of brothers back in WTHQ on standby to report on these things, kind of like a JW version of a newsdesk at BBC, CNN, etc, and maybe local 'correspondents' in key countries - after all, they boast about their own website,
televangelistbroadcasting channel and how they raise money to support congregations worldwide. Even if they do have such a thing, it moves too slowly - or maybe it's heavily centralised and vetted in what it can report, like old-school Soviet media, and has to wait for approval from GB censors for what it can say and how?
The tragedy of the flooding in Spain started to unfold from about Sept 29 according to Wikipedia, so let's see how long it is before anything appears on the JW website. If their previous track record is anything to go by, it could be another few days to a week. -
Journeyman
The tragedy of the flooding in Spain started to unfold from about Sept 29 according to Wikipedia
Sorry, I meant: "The tragedy of the flooding in Spain started to unfold from about Oct 29..." - so about a week ago now.
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Slidin Fast
It's finally dropped about a week late. Counts as breaking news I suppose.
It was a horrible event. People in built up towns sitting in traffic jams were just inundated, swept away and drowned by flash floods. Pretty extreme.
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Beth Sarim
Its extreme.
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Journeyman
It's finally dropped about a week late.
Yes, I've noticed that's about "normal" for the Org. Major world disaster breaks - even in an easily accessible part of the world with good communications - and it takes them about 1-2 weeks to report on it.
It's possible they wait until they're heard about the local Witnesses first before reporting (hence why they always list how many JWs were killed, KHs damaged, etc), but that hardly makes it breaking or up-to-date news. It would make more sense to make at least a brief report acknowledging the tragedy ASAP, then fill in the personal details with an update later.
It was a horrible event.
Yes, I didn't follow it too closely at first - just put it down to another horrible flash-flooding tragedy, which are becoming more common in Europe these days - but the anger on the international news of the people against their King, shouting and throwing mud at him and his wife, made me sit up and realise this was not "just" another tragedy, but it seems there was governmental and military incompetence around not getting support out in time to the victims.