It's been a long 9 years Lloyd Evans / John Cedars

by Newly Enlightened 11530 Replies latest watchtower scandals

  • Simon
    Simon
    I doubt "cheating on wife with prostitute" makes up a very large percentage of disfellowshippings for 'immorality'.

    No, it's definitely further along on the "immoral" spectrum than say, cheating on your spouse with someone you know or arranged to meet in a car-park online. Both are immoral, one is worse. Are you genuinely finding these things challenging concepts or surprising? You seem determined to misunderstand what I say or add some unnecessary spin to it as though I've said something I haven't.

  • Nathan Natas
    Nathan Natas

    Diogenesister, what does NHS mean as you use it here?

  • Simon
    Simon

    Probably National Health Service - the public / taxpayer-funded socialist sometimes-health-care system in the UK.

  • Vintage
    Vintage

    Diogenesister, It’s my hope that the Watchtower mistreatment of those discarded elders will eventually cause the former elders’ brain cells to start firing and for them to wake up. It took many betrayals by the Watchtower Society for me to realize that they didn’t care whether I lived or died. In fact, I suspect that if they cared at all what was happening to me, a few may have been favoring the latter option. Watchtower’s worst fear was probably that a recovering alcoholic elder might blab a deep, dark Watchtower secret.

  • Vintage
    Vintage

    Anna Marina, I'd had no idea that J P Morgan backed Zion's Watchtower. The name J P Morgan only made me think of finances.

  • Anna Marina
    Anna Marina

    Hi Vintage - take a look at Jan 1 WT 1911 p 1-4.

    Also I note the cover says The Watch Tower, Herald of Christ's Presence, not Zion's Watchtower, so I got that bit wrong. All the same you can see C T Russell praising J P Morgan's ecumenical movement and linking it to Zionism.

    Exactly what the relationship was between J P Morgan and C T Russell was I don't know. But he has subtitled that section as Morgan's Church Federation and says it was foretold in scripture and that he (C T Russell) has been pointing it out for 30 years.

    Watchtower & Awake Magazines of Jehovah's Witnesses (avoidjw.org)

  • KatKat
    KatKat

    I wonder which of Lloyd Evans' morals moves him to advocate for mandatory reporting to official authorities in religious groups and the JWs organisation in particular? Is it something like 'Every person has the right of protection of the integrity of their own body'? I don't know which exact moral he has but it must be something similar to this. Or has he got no morals and his activism is all about virtue signalling?

    I am also thinking, his activism is not just about mandatory reporting of CSA but also adults who were coerced into staying silent just to protect the community/religion they were in. Lloyd Evans interviewed adult women who were coerced from their religious group to stay silent about their abuse. They were coerced into letting the religious group they were in, deal internally with the allegations. He made us think he cared deeply about the peoples right of protection of the integrity of their own body. Their right to report to the authorities. Their right that worldly consequences happen to the person who harmed them.

    In Thailand the sex workers have no rights. SW is illegal and therefore there is no legal framework for them. How are they supposed to report to the police without incriminating themselves? It doesn't matter in which position they are in. If they are trafficked, they most likely have their passport taken away and are controlled by their pimps to make them money. If they are under age, do they have the assertiveness to tell the people they have sex with where their limits are? Will the people listen? And when they become adults, did they ever learn how to be assertive? How can Lloyd Evans distinguish between the different situation the women are in? Is he asking if they are trafficked? Is he asking how desperate their situation is and evaluates then if he uses them?

    Some women might have been able to start SW as adults. They might have made the decision between the possibility to earn little in a legal job or earn more with SW. But that's the only choice they are given by their society. Most likely they also have their parents to support and maybe their own children. Why is Lloyd Evans choosing to buy sex of women who are in such weak positions? If one of his excuses is to 'help' them, he can give his money to charities who support SWs to get an education to move away from SW into a legal job. How does this fit with his value that people should have the right of protection of the integrity of their own body?

    I believe Lloyd Evans chooses women in weak positions because it is unlikely that they reject his money and therefore him and his wishes. If he would be emotionally and morally developed he wouldn't find it sexually arousing to be with women half his age and with no rights in their society AND dependent on his money. This all speaks so much against any sincere value he could possibly have that moves him to advocating for abuse survivors in religious groups.

    Does this make Lloyd Evans any different to the predators who enter religions to abuse women because they know they will have no legal consequences? I don't think so. His excuse that they were over 18 and they agreed to exchange sex for money doesn't mean much in this instance. They have nowhere to go to report when they were harmed. They are entirely dependent on Lloyd Evans' good will. This is also the case in many other countries. He does seem to care about the abuse in the JW org but not the abuse of SWs he had intercourse with. Why is he not helping them? Instead he pays them to fulfill his fantasies.

    If he is not aware of this discrepancy in his behaviour then he is extremely immature and shouldn't be in any way close to abuse survivors because he could do more harm then good. And if he is aware of this discrepancy but tries to gaslight us, then he is outright dangerous to his environment. I believe it is a mix of both. Why should we believe he treats his SWs with respect when he treats Dijana so appallingly and is so manipulative towards her?

    I'm sorry that this is so long. I hope it is clear enough to read. I think the discussion about morals is very interesting. I hope it could make the people who defend Lloyd Evans understand a bit better why people want him to step back from is activism.

  • Vintage
    Vintage

    You're quite a historian, Anna Marina. That avoidjw website is fabulous, isn't it? Watchtower has been churning out garbage for such a long time. Even the Finished Mystery book (1960's?) had silly, petty things that were heralded as grandiose fulfillments of prophecies. And I thrilled to it. Yep, I waded through Fred Franz' verbiage to understand those golden nuggets of truth. (Sigh) Cults do that to people's power of reason.

    So, "The Watch Tower, Herald of Christ's Presence, not Zion's Watchtower". Okay, thanks. The belief system that it presented was the gift that keeps on giving. My grandparents "found the truth" and sadly their three children inculcated Watchtowerism (with all its hypocrisy) into their children, too.

  • Vintage
    Vintage

    Great post, KitKat. Nice to meet you here.

  • Simon
    Simon
    I'm sorry that this is so long. I hope it is clear enough to read. I think the discussion about morals is very interesting. I hope it could make the people who defend Lloyd Evans understand a bit better why people want him to step back from is activism.

    That was an excellent summation of the key component of all this - why Kim had a duty (qualified privilege) to reveal what he was doing, to protect the vulnerable, and why he has no business being around vulnerable young women.

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