Nitty Gritty,
This is a very good question you ask: "If Mr. Bundy is such an exceptional investigator, then he ought to ask himself why? Why is an organization that claims to be morally superior to any other organization on earth "supposedly" protecting pedophiles?"
Trey expressed this very question to me himself as a matter of fact. He expressed surprise to me that they were not willing to meet with him to explain their side of the story for the record. He asked me my opinion on why I thought they wouldn't want to hurry to explain their side of the story to the press.
To me though, a related question would be: "Why would an innocent organization stonewall a reporter who could help them clear up misconceptions?"
Both questions are answered by this: Extreme hubris, coupled with a reckless application of Bible theology.
First, I don't believe it is the Watch Towers GOAL to protect pedophiles. No clear thinking person would believe they get behind closed doors and say to each other: "OK, let's see if we can make up some rules that would make it VERY easy to abuse children so that we can attract as many child abuse cases per member as the Catholic Church." No. That doesn't happen.
But what does happen is their hubris gets the best of them in their application of their often warped Bible theology and then bad things happen to their members as a result.
This is about more than child abuse issue too. It can be applied to their attitudes about the extreme shunning (disfellowshipping) policy, their rules related to blood transfusions, their attitudes towards higher education, their not allowing members to get a voting card in Malawi, and so on. They take what they believe are Biblical principles and apply them in an extreme and often reckless way that result in their members committing suicide, needlessly dying in operations, staying poor and depressed and financially stressed the rest of their lives, getting persecuted and killed in Malawi, and so on. No, they don't SET OUT to cause these things, but their policies and attitudes RESULT in them. If challenged by anyone by any of these things, they will double down because they are the Faithful and Discreet Slave after all, backed by Jehovah Himself. They can't be wrong, and if "True Christians" must suffer for their faith, so be it.
Regarding the child abuse problem specifically, this recklessness and hubris consists of them thinking they actually know better than the authorities on how to handle "congregational matters" and "to keep free from reproach on Jehovah". They don't consider that the "two witness rule" is one of principle to make sure an innocent person is not convicted on one person's word, but that in modern times this can mean guilt being proven in more ways than literally "two witnesses to the same alleged event."
Because of this hubris and recklessness, they try to handle these things themselves internally (where there is often partiality shown because JWs have a very definite pecking order) rather than relying on outside authorities to neutrally investigate ALL ACCUSATIONS and just letting the chips fall where they may with people who do this for a living. They actually believe they know better about the psychology of repeat offense tendencies, how to know when someone is "truly repentant" and won't offend again and so on. They actually believe this approach protects Jehovah's Organization.
Again, hubris and recklessness.
Regarding the dishonesty part, this comes in when the Watch Tower claims there is "no official policy of silence" that is enforced for an alleged victim. This is what the Wikipedia page says on it:
The hearing was told that in response to a summons issued by the commission, the Watch Tower Society had produced 5000 documents including 1006 case files relating to allegations of child sexual abuse made against members of the Jehovah’s Witness church in Australia since 1950—each file for a different alleged perpetrator of child sexual abuse. Those documents showed that of the 1006 alleged perpetrators of child sexual abuse "not one was reported by the Church to secular authorities". The commission was told: "This suggests that it is the practice of the Jehovah’s Witness Church to retain information regarding child sexual abuse offenses but not to report allegations of child sexual abuse to the police or other relevant authorities."
An elder from the Australian branch office said that when not required by law to report abuse allegations to authorities, the church left the decision to report to authorities with the victim and his or her family.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jehovah%27s_Witnesses%27_handling_of_child_sex_abuse
(Side note: It's pretty sad when your church has an entire Wikipedia page devoted to "alleged" child abuse problems.)
Back to my point, can you believe that in 1,006 potential cases of child abuse, from files produced by the Watch Tower Society itself mind you, NOT ONE got reported to the authorities. Not one! Do you really think this is by accident or coincidence?
And this after the Watch Tower representative twists the truth by saying "the decision to report to the authorities is with the victim and his or her family". Really? You mean this was up to 1,006 families to report an alleged abuse to police and not one of them decided to do it, without any pressure whatsoever? Do you really believe this? This is the same claim the Watch Tower makes when they say "A family member can speak to a disfellowshipped one if they want to, it's their decision."
Sure, families can talk to disfellowshipped ones "if they want to", sure a family can report an alleged abuse to authorities "if they want to", sure someone can get a blood transfusion "if they want to", but they will pay the price for it in their congregations one way or the other, either by losing privileges, losing friends and family relationships or even being disfellowshipped for good.
This positioning of "you can do it if you want to" is a bald faced lie and every JW and ex-JW knows it.
