by z2ara 15 Replies latest watchtower scandals
I wrote a letter to the elders of the congregation here, in which i ask them to send me my complete dossier, i dont want them to have any information about me left in their hands.
Untill now , its 3 weeks left , i got no response.
Has anybody experiences with this and how to handle the problem?
I am planning to go to court to force the elders to give me my dossier about me, because we have a law on privacy here.
Can anybody give some advices?
yes my advice would be to not worry about it...if they don't come round then you haven't much to worry about. Your friends,relatives, fellow witlesses have all the juice on you and the files are few if far between. You aren't some super apostate that they keep tabs on or even are in contact with. Give yourself a break from it and don't worry so much. After all, you are in charge of your life and it is really the Turkish police you should be worried about...
Sincerely,
District Overbeer
I don't know whare you are but if you are in the UK there is the Data Protection act and they have to give you the information by law. If they do not respond in a timeley way, you can complain to the DP registrar.
Just before the end of my Witness career, my pioneer partner (deep into the Greek text and A.T. Robertson's books) asked for his "dossier" - pioneer card, publisher records, etc. and he was flatly told no. He was later disfellowshipped and I stopped door to door and began studying the Scriptures in the original languages, as well as the history of prophetic "interpretation." When I was finally convinced of their errors, I wanted my dossier too, but knew they would never give it to me. I was invited for a J.C. meeting one Thursday night, but that night things were backed up - a drunken m.s. at a party the previous weekend, a sister who was "fooling around" with a bible study, and a sister who had applied for temporary pioneering, but her skirts were too short and her makeup was too "slutty" for the committee. I sat for a long time in the library as they used other K.H. rooms, when it dawned on me... I once was the accounting servant and remembered that many times the locked boxes of records in the Hall were left unlocked. I took a deep breath, checked, and sure enough - unlocked. I took my information and my former wife's information, left the library, and found the room where they were counseling the brother about his half naked dance while intoxicated and told them I didn't have time to wait, and they looked at me with incredulity. I told them, "it's now or never." They said they'd be with me after the "others." I said "cool" and left them to berate Brother Drinker. I left the hall and to this day have my pioneer card and all my publisher records. Quite a few times they visited my home and wanted to know if I ever saw my paperwork or my former wife's. "No. Did you loose that too?" Never once, "how are you?" Instead one brother wanted to punch me out, as another brother restained him.
I left the hall and to this day have my pioneer card and all my publisher records.
What exactly does that consist of? What is in your records? Is it all of your publisher timesheets? Is that all? Or do they have notes on you?
Speaking of obtaining records, I wonder... Are there any active JW elders on this board (who are in undercover) who might be willing to work out some sort of system to obtain old publisher records for ex-JW's. What is involved in having records transferred elsewhere? Could an elder contact the old hall, tell them that John Doe just transferred to his hall and he'd like John's records transferred? Then give them his home address or some such thing. When the records arrive, the undercover elder receives them and forwards them on to the ex-JW.
Of course, to make it work, the undercover elder couldn't say that the ex-JW just started attending a congregation in Los Angeles and be known to still be living in New York. But, putting through multiple requests shouldn't raise any suspicions if they're to different halls all over the country - as long as the undercover elder's hall doesn't see the mail. And I assume the old hall isn't going to suspect anything and start going through hoops to verify that this is a legitimate request (or are they?).
Would this work? Or are there some procedures in place to prevent this from happening without detection?
For that matter, could I just have somebody pretend to be an elder and request this info? Would they check to see if I was a valid congregation? Would they only ship the records to a Kingdom Hall's address? Do Kingdom Halls ever have PO boxes that you could have these things sent to? I could set up a PO box and tell them to ship it to the XXX congregation at ___ and give them my PO box, attention (name of an elder). The post office isn't going to question the name and I can find out the names of local congregations and their elders.
Of course, this might be easier for me, since I several hundred miles from where I last attended a hall. So, not many people back there can dispute that I didn't start going to a hall again. And, it'd be harder for them to determine that this really isn't a hall.
Thanks to high-control governments of the past who collected waaaay to much information on their citizens (Nazis, Communists), there is a movement to improve the rights of citizens to control the information collected on them. In the European/Canadian model of personal information, this information belongs to you, not to the person who holds it. You have a right to know what information they have on you. Some countries have time limits on how long it takes the organization to respond to your request. So far in Canada, this right is extended to government agencies, not the private sector or the churches.
I have cringed when I see former members ask the WTS to destroy any information they have on them. How in the heck could you confirm that they really did what you asked? This poster has the right idea. Ask for it back.
Then again, there is nothing stopping the WTS from keeping a copy for themselves.
not the private sector or the churches.
I work in finance, and since Jan 1, 2004, we comply with privacy. When learning about it, Charitable Organizations fall under the Privacy Act. Isn't the WTBTS registered as a charity?
In Canada, I would assume they would have to comply. You could always check out the Privacy Commissioner's site.
Lawrence, that is too cool. You are now my hero!
My suspicion is that, if the elders don't want to turn records over, even if they are legally required to do so, they'll likely just deny that such records exist. Perhaps they might hand over some papers, but hang on to copies of everything. They just want to feel like they still have some measure of control over us, so maybe it's best to just walk away and not look back. That'll really piss them off!
My apologies, since 2001 some privacy provisions include the private sector in Canada, where that information is being collected for commercial use. Churches are exempt.
So what can we do here in the US?
