Maybe shunning is not a legal crime---------but it sure as hell is a moral crime!
just saying!
Make Shunning A Hate Crime
by Lost in the fog 27 Replies latest watchtower beliefs
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dubstepped
I'm not sure if I'm in favor it it being criminal but I certainly don't think that organizations like Jehovah's Witnesses that promote it from the top down should be given charitable status.
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LoveUniHateExams
Yeah, I like Dubstepped's point.
Shunning shouldn't be a crime at all but it should lose Watchtower its charity status.
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under the radar
I agree that the concept of "hate crime" is merely a construct born of political correctness. A crime is a crime, no worse or no less serious simply because of who the victim is. I would only support an "enhanced" penalty if the victim was a public official (like a political figure or a law enforcement officer) AND they were targeted BECAUSE of their status or in connection with performing their official duties.
I also agree that shunning itself should not be outlawed. Such a law could never be enforced anyway. However, I would support a law prohibiting any group, including any religion, from MANDATING that its followers shun certain others. I would even go further and support an official ban of any group or religion that encouraged its followers to physically harm non-members or former members. Just because an ideology masquerades as a religion doesn't give it the right to foment violence against others. They should not be allowed to hide beyond the law.
All that said, I personally don't think that any government should give tax exemptions to ANY religion. If any religious groups claim to be a charity, their activities should be closely examined to determine whether they are actually performing charity work or not. Helping only their followers or designating any kind of proselytizing as "charity" should immediately disqualify them. The blanking Society uses every trick in the book to maintain their "charity" status when anyone who knows anything about them knows they don't do any real charity at all. Their blatant duplicity includes shuffling money around between their various organizations to hide where their money comes from, how it's distributed, and what they use it for.
Blankety blank this forking cult!
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Simon
Sigh, this shit again?
Shunning someone isn't a hate crime and besides the whole notion of hate crimes is mental.
All that is needed is 'crime', there is no need for any distinction as to the motivation. The act should be the be-all and end-all of prosecutions.
Which is why it won't work because seriously, you want to make "someone won't talk to me" a criminal offence?
There are people stabbing each other on the street and you want to government dealing with "mommy didn't say hello to me"? I guess it's one step up from "someone said something I disagree with on Twitter" which is what they currently waste time on.
You seriously want to give the government that power over your life and you are so incredibly short sighted that you don't imagine that power will be misused and abused like government power always inevitably is?!?
You imagine that it will only be used to force THEM to talk to YOU. How about the government marches you to a KH because THEY want to see YOU there at the meetings?
If you want to make something a crime, it has to be thought out - that includes all the consequences of designating something a crime and how things can be prosecuted.
It's cruel, it's unpleasant, but it should not be illegal. As a "victim" of shunning, I'd rather live in a world where shunning was allowed than live in a police state that could dictate who I had to talk to and associate with.
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hybridous
It's cruel, it's unpleasant, but it should not be illegal. As a "victim" of shunning, I'd rather live in a world where shunning was allowed than live in a police state that could dictate who I had to talk to and associate with.
Not to mention, as I've progressed forward in life - OUT & AWAY from the JW religion...
It has occurred to me that, there certainly are instances in life where, I absolutely reserve and demand for myself the right to associate (and NOT associate), with whom I please.
If I must be a 'victim' of such - even for specious reasons - then that is the price that I must be willing to pay for their own right to my own free association.
I suspect that we all recognize the right of all people to make such choices for themselves. Probably, what is really most objectionable are the pervasive and insidious demands that the WTORG foists upon its parishioners. Namely, that they turn over their choice making in the use of such, to the organization's demands.
Please realize that this, too, is a person's rightful choice to make. A person has the absolute right to turn over the responsibility for making all of life's choices to a group of religious charlatans, who they have likely never even met, for unfalsifiable promises of everlasting life in the world to come.
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LongHairGal
LOST IN THE FOG:
No, as much as I think shunning by JWs toward family members is awful, I do not believe it should be a ‘hate crime’. There are people I don’t want to speak to either.
You haven’t thought about the unintended consequences as others here have brought out.
What I think SHOULD be looked into is Witnesses making home life hell for minors who do not want the religion. These minors are either thrown out of the house to fend for themselves at a young age OR they have to become emancipated. I know of two cases where Witnesses did this to their children. Luckily they turned out fine.
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Finkelstein
Does an organization have the right to devolve a family under a shunning policy, under a premise of free choice by an individual regarding a religion, even if the individual is not vocally in opposition to a established religion ?
This is what is being analyzed and discussed.
The JWS have been for a very long time openly vocal about other religious groups calling them false religions guided by Satan.
Is that a hate crime ?
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Simon
Does an organization have the right to devolve a family under a shunning policy, under a premise of free choice by an individual regarding a religion, even if the individual is not vocally in opposition to a established religion ?
They don't have the power to do that.
All they can do is suggest ideas, other people chose to believe them or not and follow the doctrines.
Free will means the right for stupid people to believe idiotic nonsense and ruin their lives.
I'd still rather have freedom.
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Finkelstein
I can see the religious organizations having the ability to shun or DF people who are openly opposed who are still wanting to attend and participate in some way.
Thats their expressed right but to publicly DF someone simply for choosing to not wanting to participate for whatever reason, maybe to go over another religion, that doesn't seem right.
Thats why it very important for people wanting to leave the JWS say nothing of any particular reason especially if they were baptized.
They cant DF you if you dont state why concerning established doctrines .