My flyers merely said: “If as a Jehovah’s Witness, a member of your family has been molested Information is available For further information see: www.silentlambs.org Or call 1-877-WTABUSE.”
Nothing overtly inflammatory, actually more like a public service announcement.
I guess that’s what most of the local organizers and ‘friends’ thought in my neck of the, woods for the first two days of the district convention! But once the 'friends' realized that the website I was promoting with my flyers and moving car billboard was NOT an approved WT site, the powers that be got ... well ... “pissed” is the word!
See? Nobody bothered me on Friday as I went smiling about my posting flyers on the light and utility poles on the routes to/from the convention site. On Saturday, I posted them a bit further afield and also drove around at peak traffic times with front and rear windshield/screen “decals” that read www.silentlambs.org.
By Sunday morning when I arrived with the added attraction of the flyer reproduced 200%, laminated and taped to the side of my van, the flyers had been torn down!!!
Well! That got my Irish (my mother says my “Viking” -- LOL) up! So I calmly and serenely began re-posting them. I immediately replaced the ones on the four corners of the busiest intersection in the area. It was early yet, though, not much traffic. So I spent some time making certain that the farther away ones were still up (they were! ) and replacing the ones closer in that I could do without being observed. Then I drove around in my moving billboard while the traffic built up around the convention site as the “Friends” arrived.
When traffic died down, I called my 12 year old son for assistance. I picked him up from home with the intention that he would help me by hopping out of the van along streets where there was no parking to post flyers while I kept the car running with flashers on.
We began at one gate on the north side of the convention site, and methodically posted every third light pole (with a few flyers facing inward towards the parking lot as well in addition to those facing oncoming traffic at exit time). By the time we got to the corner, my son said, “Someone’s following us!” “What!? So?” “I mean, they’re following us and taking down the flyers!” I checked my rear view mirror, and did, indeed see Brother Blueshirt hopping out of a van, dashing to a light pole, and fairly running to hop back in and on to the next light pole!
When he got close enough to fairly snatch the flyer off the pole before my son had returned to the car, he told me to stop! What I was doing wasn’t right. I just smiled (condescendingly, may God forgive me! [8>]).
We carried on to that busy intersection where the flyers had been torn down AGAIN! We reposted on two corners, and they persistently followed us across the street. Next we made a U-turn, to work the East side of the parking lot, and they followed us again. When we pulled over just before an entry into the lot to post again (my son was undaunted!) the scene became surreal!!!
Van #1 pulled up around and in front of us to block our forward progress. Van #2 pulled up and blocked our forward movement completely, while Brother Compadre walks up to my window and motions for me to roll it down. Meanwhile, Van #3 is blocking my rear quarter panel.
I felt like the criminal in a movie chase scene, surrounded by the cops who would have been shouting, “Get out of the car, hold your hands up in the air, and spread ‘em!”
I rolled down the window and Brother C. tells me that I must stop posting. I say, “I don’t think so. It’s called freedom of speech.” “But you cannot post on private property!” “I am not posting on private property! I’m posting on light poles and telephone poles!” “If you were a Christian, you’d know that you need a permit to post in this town!” As huge Brother Bouncer pulls up, I retort, “If you were Christians you wouldn’t harbor pedophiles in your organization!” “We don’t,” says Brother B. “Oh, but you do!”
“You cannot post your flyers on private property.” “I am not posting on private property. Please move your vehicle out of my way and stop trying to intimidate me.” “We’re not trying to intimidate you. But you must realize that you cannot keep doing this.” “Yes, I can, and I will! The police were watching for the last two days as I posted right in front of them and didn’t say a word!” To me, “The police have been busy.” Into his mobile radio, “Call [arena] security!” I backed up and pulled away.
I proceeded out onto the street, away from the arena, taking a circuitous route that wouldn’t betray my other posted flyers further afield!
Not trying to intimidate, eh? THEY TAILED US!!!! Van #1 followed me into city center and back out. I lost ‘em, though! I braked hard and turned abruptly into a parking lot as they had to keep moving past me in the fast lane! I slowly made my way back to the arena, wanting to be the moving billboard again during lunchtime. Not stopping to post, however.
Wouldn’t you know that Van #1 showed up in my rear view mirror near the arena large as life??? And FOLLOWED ME ONTO THE NEARBY FREEWAY AND THEN ONTO THE SHOULDER !!!???!!!
Now I got pissed. We had already noted the license plate number. And so I phoned the cops on my cell phone as they sat idling behind us.
The officer I spoke with affirmed that I really should have had either a permit OR permission from the Department of Public Works to post flyers in their city. (Duly noted for next year!) He also said that arena security had every right to tear down anything posted on their private property and to follow me off their property in a car. However, I explained that
1/ first of all I had never been on the arena property; and
2/ it was not ARENA security who was tailing me away from the arena and onto public streets and thoroughfares after having surrounded me and having torn down the flyers, but the JEHOVAH’S WITNESS ATTENDANTS!!!
He was a bit taken aback at that! (Good! People need to know the WT is NOT a nice organization!) He asked me if they were still behind me, but they had left. He told me that he could not prevent them following me, but were they to follow and threaten me I should call back at once.
I them made sure that riding around with my moving billboard was kosher in his town and he said there was no problem at all with that!
I then left the area, -- I have a LIFE!!! -- went to my son’s soccer/football final (they won, 1-0, thank you!), a tour of a new middle school building, and returned to the convention site in time for the mass exodus!
Imagine my surprise when, as I moved into the left turn lane that would bring me onto a boulevard leading back to the arena, Brother Blueshirt pulled up alongside, wagging his finger at me, mouthing “No more!” I laughed at him and he wagged his finger again, “No more!!!” He pointed to his companion, a sister, who leaned forward and proudly showed me a flyer that had been torn down! I just shook my head, laughing at them both and feeling pity for this poor loser of an attendant assigned to pull down all my work all afternoon in 87 degree F. heat! And then proceeded towards the high volume, post-convention traffic area.
Funnily enough, the cops kept stopping my lane of traffic every time I hit the main intersection, so that all the traffic waved ahead got an opportunity to read my billboard! I was never so happy to be stuck in Sunday night convention traffic in MY ENTIRE LIFE as a JW! I enjoyed being the “evil apostate” so much, I’m thinking about going back again next year on behalf of www.ajwrb.org!
All in all, a most GRATIFYING District Convention!
outnfree
(who was really 'out there' this weekend!
Edited to remove a potentially inflammatory racial reference -- Okay, Mom? And anyone who wants may substitute "extremely irate" for "pissed" in the 3rd paragraph, too