JW profit from disasters

by enoughisenough 34 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

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  dropoffyourkeylee

  If my roof is storm damaged and the “ Brothers “ repair it for free , I have suffered no loss. I cannot claim on insurance. If the householder makes a claim based on commercial rates ... it is fraudulent.

  I concur with DOC here. I do understand how the insurance market works, as I worked in insurance for nearly 20 years before retirement.

  What the WT is doing is not fraud from an insurance perspective.

  Homeowner has a covered loss. Homeowner files a claim on homeowner insurance. Insurance claims adjuster assess the value of the loss and

  offers a dollar amount to the insured. The homeowner can get any contractor they want to do the work, they can even do it all themselves if they want to.

  What the WT is doing is running what is essentially a construction company with volunteer labor, using free labor and donated or discounted materials. The WT collects the money as a 'donation'

  What I find objectionable is that the messaging around it is misleading. They make it sound like the disaster relief work is part of their Christian life and duties. It isn't. It is a fundraising activity for the WT, nothing more.
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  Drearyweather

  I am not sure how it happens in US, but during the 2004 Tsunami, the WT in India built and repaired around 350 houses of JW's in the affected area, and almost none of them had homeowner insurance as it's not a popular form of Insurance here in India. I know because I coordinated the relief efforts during that time and was on the committee that had oversight.

  During COVID, Angola, Zimbabwe and Venezuela were provided with relief in the same way.

  I am not sure of Wt actually makes any "profit" out of disasters - whatever that means, unless there are actual numbers to prove.
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  Magnum

  Drearyweather,

  See my previous post on this thread. Many groups other than the JW organization make big profits on disaster relief.

  The org profits not only by receiving insurance checks for free labor and marking up materials, but by donations sent in by individual JWs. Here in the U.S., JWs are instructed to make donations without specifying that they are for disaster relief because the org wants to use the money for its own interests, not for helping disaster victims.

  I'd like to know who paid for the materials in India. I once saw a warehouse full of materials that the JW org was supposedly donating to disaster relief. Every bit of it was donated by individual JWs - not the org.
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  Freeorange

  My husband and I were involved with the Katrina relief work out of the Kenner hub. We saw massive fraud. The org was constantly getting donated materials dropped at the KH like sheet rock, lumber, etc from Home Depot and other suppliers. We were rooming with another couple, he was in the accounting and she was in the food department. He would tell us about the donations and processing the friend’s insurance claims. I wish I paid more attention at the time but we were deeply PIMI and it was long, hot days of work. We had a very strange situation with the meals on site.

  The “brother” in charge of the kitchen was short tempered and would yell loudly at the sisters prepping the food and cussed a lot! It made things very tense and the sister would often come back to the house we were sharing in tears. But as usual we all covered it over and reassured each other it was due to the stressful assignment. Oddly the same foul brother was running a side hustle from the site. He had hats and T-shirts printed up with JW Disaster Relief and would sell them to the volunteers. He was very pushy about it (we even bought them to make him shut up) and claimed it was to support his volunteer efforts. He would hang the hats and stuff right on the KH kitchen trailer with pricing in full view of all the overseers and no one said a word the entire time. We often wonder what was really going on - who was he really?

  Anyway we felt we were doing a good thing and glossed over so many strange things. Here we were a big, noisy group that would roll up on a residential street and basically take over, parking multiple trucks and trailers in front of the neighbors homes. When the homeless would ask for food (there were so many displaced after the storm) we would turn them away even though we had tons of food. As a group we were anything but charitable. So many things from that experience that still bother us.
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  Magnum

  Freeorange, Your story rings very true to me.

  I excused many, many things over the years, too. It infuriates me now to think all the time, money, effort, etc. I gave to that cult.
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  peacefulpete

  I'm surprised by the Indian relief effort. I'm sure those effected appreciated it. In my limited missionary experience, we had a UN declared disaster but never was any assistance offered. The branch was so broke, I can't imagine their being able to.
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  enoughisenough

  FreeOrange, the part about the homeless asking for food and being turned away...Mercy...How coldhearted can you be. Reminds me of the Jesus saying when you give something to eat to the lowest of these....you have done it to me. I guess the self righteous JW never thought of that scripture...I couldn't treat a dog like that. Truly sad, truly maddening!
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  Foolednomore

  I have seen some real shifty building practices done on WT jobs.
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  Freeorange

  Magnum we find ourselves going down that angry path more often than we would like. We think about the homes, cars, time, and just straight up $$ we have thrown at the org. We are horrified we spent the prime income producing years of our lives driving around rural Appalachia in a Buick pioneering with people we couldn’t stand.

  EIE we too were so embarrassed by the complete lack of empathy to anyone that was a non JW. We had so much food there onsite including a full on dessert display refrigerator stocked with all kinds of cakes and pies. The kitchen volunteers tossed anything that was more than three days old. The homeless would try and dig through the trash and the brothers always shooed them off.
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  enoughisenough

  Freeorange...may I quote some of what you have written about throwing away food instead of feeding the homeless?