Sorry, Marvin, was addressing when you asked for possible reasons for a bump in the mid-80s. Those are the only things I can think of to explain that. Their habit of torching older elders' letters makes it difficult to establish whether there was anything branch directed, but one would suspect not. The 89/early 90s bump, well, yes, as discussed on other threads over the past couple of weeks.
Mephis
JoinedPosts by Mephis
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37
Australian Branch Stats?
by Marvin Shilmer ini'm working on some statistical analysis of child abuse data made public by the royal commission.
while i'm working on this, can someone here do me a favor and look up the peak publisher figures reported by watchtower for the australian branch for each of the years from 2005 through 2014?
my thanks in advance.
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This article indicates the org will consider policy changes
by defender of truth ini think they were just telling the arc what they wanted to hear.. what do you think?.
couple of interesting quotes:.
"mr o'brien, co-ordinator of the church's australian branch committee, told the commission the organisation was "open to change".. in evidence, he said the committee would consider the greater involvement of women in child sex abuse cases, clearer guidance for elders hearing allegations and better communication with victims and their families about their legal options.. mr o'brien told the commission the church did not have a redress scheme for sex abuse victims but would consider establishing one.. vincent toole, head of the church's watchtower bible and tract society, told the commission he would seek independent legal advice about the church's obligations to report child sex abuse to the authorities.. justice mcclellan asked mr toole if he understood there was a general obligation for every citizen to report crimes to the authorities.. "coming to this commission has been a wake-up call for me, i can assure you," mr toole said.. www.smh.com.au/nsw/royal-commission-jehovahs-witnesses-to-review-approach-to-sex-abuse-allegations-20150805-gis2fh.html.
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Mephis
The perils of running your own internal judicial process which determines 'guilt' for crimes. But I suppose it goes to the heart of how they treat crimes as 'sins', as well as how they have no consideration for the wider community. It also highlights the dangers of their own internal legal advice viewing everything only through the prism of what comes down from the GB.
There's no change in policy as such for them. It's, as Witness My Fury says, simply they've not had the common sense to report crimes to the police and so have been breaking the law because they 'know', by any reasonable standard, that crimes have been committed and haven't been reporting. Typically they'd try to use confessional privilege to defend themselves from any obligation to report under this law, but they've not been doing that in Oz, and after Stewart's demolition of how it shouldn't be considered 'secret' I wonder whether other common law jurisdictions will take another look at the issue from this angle.
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shunning verses victamization
by Sabin ini know i`ve put this out there before but i want to put it in a different context & see what you think.
i`ve shunned my parents for 20 years (farther, step-mother) because they victimized me every day of my life as a child, believe me when i tell you that writing this , is unbelievable hard, it is making me shake & cry to be pulling up the memories.
all of what happened i could have forgiven, but one thing.
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Mephis
They say themselves, when it's about people joining the JWs, that people shouldn't be forced to choose between family and belief/religion. Not having people who are harmful in your life is a personal choice. Having your religion emotionally manipulate you into shunning someone solely because eg they believe different things to you is a different thing again from that. There's a very clear difference there to me. -
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Australian Branch Stats?
by Marvin Shilmer ini'm working on some statistical analysis of child abuse data made public by the royal commission.
while i'm working on this, can someone here do me a favor and look up the peak publisher figures reported by watchtower for the australian branch for each of the years from 2005 through 2014?
my thanks in advance.
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Mephis
Marvin - there was a WT article in October 1983 which pretty much encouraged those who'd been abused within the family to go to the elders for 'spiritual help'. 1985 started with the Awake on child molestation. Not sure if that would explain any bump in numbers for the period you mention. -
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Watchtower sued for Racketeering in California
by under the radar ina little birdie informed me that a lawsuit against the watchtower bible & tract society, its legal department, and several individuals (perhaps lawyers in the legal department) has been filed in the superior court of the state of california, county of los angeles for, wait for it.... racketeering!.
that's right, folks, you heard it here first.
i have no other information, other than the case was stamped "aug 07 2015" and the docket number appears to be bc590675.
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Mephis
the girl next door posted it :)
INteresting. Representing himself?
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ARC: why the contstant secrecy?
by SecretSlaveClass inanyone watching the inquiry would have heard the org's attorney asking that the documents outlining the stucture and mechanics of the wbts be kept confidential.
all this subversive and clandestine behavior is not helping their image.
what do you all suppose is potentially damnimg in these documents?
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Mephis
It's a high control group where 'privilege' is holding a microphone. It's their little internal secrets as initiation. They have special knowledge of the 'truth'. The elders have special knowledge beyond that. Even the segregation caused by the individual schools for different people (eg pioneer school). The great secret reveal in the book could be the sun rises every morning and it would still be top secret because of who is allowed to access it and what they must do to be able to gain access. -
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UK Watch Tower branch financial info
by paradisebeauty intaken from http://apps.charitycommission.gov.uk/showcharity/registerofcharities/charitywithpartb.aspx?registeredcharitynumber=1077961&subsidiarynumber=0.
i wonder what exactly the uk charity commission is looking into.
just financial data or also practices of the watch tower?
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Mephis
There are three investigations currently going on. Barry congregation is also undergoing an operational compliance investigation (ie do the trustees know what they are meant to be doing according to law).
The statutory inquiry into the whole organisation is linked to but separate to the New Moston inquiry.
The one which is for the whole organisation will cover whether their policies are proper, whether they're legal, whether trustees of JW charities are aware of their legal responsibilities, and whether they're giving the right advice to congregations. So things like hauling people who've been abused to confront the pedophile, just out of prison for those crimes, in a judicial committee run by the CO sent by the organisation are going to be questioned.
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ARC: why the contstant secrecy?
by SecretSlaveClass inanyone watching the inquiry would have heard the org's attorney asking that the documents outlining the stucture and mechanics of the wbts be kept confidential.
all this subversive and clandestine behavior is not helping their image.
what do you all suppose is potentially damnimg in these documents?
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Mephis
The documents which they're trying to keep secret are available to be read in older versions. There's nothing there which is smoking gun or improper as such. It's more a revelation on how the GB does micromanage things, the things which are kept secret from your average JW (would they know women write Awake articles but aren't allowed to write anything related to the bible? would they know that there is provision to help cover with things like medical costs but it's to be kept secret from them?), and organisational approaches to things like bad publicity and scrutiny by governments. It's secrecy for the sake of secrecy as others have said. There may be other documents which reveal dubious tax avoidance strategies, or which give a full overview of financial affairs, but these aren't them. Would think that anything truly interesting in those terms would be conducted by letter between branch and Brooklyn in any case. -
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Jwfacts tv appearance
by sparrowdown inshout out to jwfacts.. just saw the drum.
excellent job !
!.
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Mephis
Youtube link. (via fb)
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There is likely to be two parts to Geoffrey Jackson's Subpeona
by Listener inwe've been focusing on the fact that geoffrey jackson will be subpoenaed to be a witness at the australian royal commission but he will also be required to present a witness statement before his appearance.
even if he continues to wiggle out of the appearance he has no excuse for not presenting his witness statement.. this statement will have to address questions set out by the commission and will need to be answered.
without doubt the answers he is able to be aided by his lawyers and more 'experienced' jws but as he is signing the document they will be his answers and he will be responsible for their truthfulness.. had he shown more willingness to appear prior to yesterday the questions asked by the commission in that statement would not have been written with the same amount of insight that they now have.
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Mephis
Think much depends on how much has actually seeped through into the JW mindset.
O'Brien could sit there, having prepared and with full knowledge of what had happened in the previous days, and still think that the issue was they've not printed the right book. They have no desire to accept any accountability or responsibility. McClellan made the point that "if you place yourself in a position to care for others and then fail, then consequences follow", but the WBTS is quite convinced that this isn't their problem. They even tried to argue that the commission was operating outside its remit because many of the cases of abuse occurred within families who just happened to be JWs. (This is in the letter exchanges related to the analysis of the WBTS' files). In other countries, they've already shown that they aren't even keen on accepting responsibility for the actions of ministerial servants and elders. McClellan seemed astounded that, in spite of months of work and discussion which they were invited to share in, the WBTS had not considered for one second how they would handle redress. But if they feel they have no responsibility, then there would be no redress. Can you imagine trying to meet a WT definition of a 'fair and just' claim even should they ever set up a fund? The organisation which specifically tells branches not to make it known their funding can be used to help publishers with things like medical expenses? Which takes the insurance premiums once paid by others but doesn't take out the external insurance and tries to persuade those supposedly covered never to claim?
I think that's the key issue for Jackson's testimony. All their publications shunt responsibility, whatever the circumstances, onto the parents. If he doesn't get that he does have a responsibility for a lot more than offering crap advice based on a pick and mix approach to how to read the bible, then it's not going to end well for him on the stand. But to accept that responsibility will be to explode any idea of this being something to handwave away as apostate lies or false media stories. I shall enjoy watching him twist because these ******* will accept the authority to inform a man he can't wear tight trousers but not their responsibility to prevent further harm to an abused child or woman when they come to know of it.