As I recall, the “Abhor What is Wicked” article came out in 1996. In it, the Society outlined their new child abuse policy, namely that “known child molesters” could never hold any positions of responsibility in the congregations anymore. From what I understand, there were letters to the bodies of elders and special C.O. instructions that further clarified the new position on handling child sexual molestation.
My question is, how was child abuse handled before then? I’ve read many stories of elders instructing brothers to keep the abuse quiet in order to prevent bringing “reproach to Jehovah’s organization” and to observe the Bible's commandment to “not bring lawsuits” against one another, but was there ever any official policy in place?
I find it upsetting that the news reports don’t highlight the fact that the policy barring "known" child molesters from being elders is a relatively new one. I wish these reports focused on their past policy and on how the new policy was brought about as a way to prevent being cleaned out by lawsuits.
In my opinion, both the new and old polices were motivated by the same desire to protect the religious organization. Their old policy, if there was one, was designed to prevent damaging the religion’s reputation and the new one is motivated by the desire to protect the religion’s assets from being decimated by lawsuits. Any thoughts?
neverendingjourney
JoinedPosts by neverendingjourney
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How was child molestation handled before 1996?
by neverendingjourney inas i recall, the abhor what is wicked article came out in 1996. in it, the society outlined their new child abuse policy, namely that known child molesters could never hold any positions of responsibility in the congregations anymore.
from what i understand, there were letters to the bodies of elders and special c.o.
instructions that further clarified the new position on handling child sexual molestation.
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neverendingjourney
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Barbara Anderson is on NBC Nightly News Tonight 11/21/07
by AndersonsInfo ina producer with nbc in new york called within the past hour to tell me that the segment i interviewed for (once in nashville, tn in august and once in washington, dc in october) is set to air tonight on nbc nightly news with brian williams, that is, if no huge calamity takes place to bump the feature.
this piece will be two minutes and 45 seconds long, the longest slot nightly news has for topics of interest, and will feature a discussion about the court documents that are found on the cd i recently produced, "secrets of pedophilia in an american religion, jehovah's witnesses in crisis.
in addition, nbc's internet site, msn, will follow with a detailed story.
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Fear of athiests
by changeling ini seemed to have missed some of the excitement from last night.
but i wanted to post my observations.. it seems to me that some have an irrational fear of athiests.
it's as if they fear we are evil people that are out to destroy their faith.
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neverendingjourney
I don't think it's the fear of atheism that motivates that kind of sentiment so much as the fear of losing one's cherished religious beliefs. It is psychologically troubling to admit that our religious beliefs and hopes for the afterlife might be wrong. I know. It led to a deep depression in me personally. It's much easier on the psyche to vilify atheists and the religiously apathetic than it is to entertain the thought that your religious belief system might be flawed. There are certainly those out there who seem to be as fervent about pushing atheism as evangelicals are about pushing their beliefs, but those folks are in the minority. In fact, "preachy" atheist threads are often provoked by believers who make insulting or downright absurd comments.
My philosophy is to live and let live. If you believe in Jehovah, Jesus, Allah, Krishna, or whomever, that's fine. Good for you. I won't criticize anyone for it as long as they respect me and everyone else who doesn't share their beliefs. But if you try to push your beliefs on me, I'm not going to take great pains to frame my response in a way that won't be offensive to you. To JWD's credit, I've never had anyone try to push their beliefs on me. I think last night's topic was much ado about nothing. Some people aren't prepared to read comments that challenge their preconceived notions about religion and react negatively when nonbelievers express their views. That’s all.
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How many times have you heard this...
by Amber Rose inalmost every non born-in jw that i know tells the same story of how they found "the truth".
and it goes like this: i didn't know anything about the bible before becoming a jw.
one day br.&sis.
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neverendingjourney
The kind of people you describe are easy prey since they have no independent basis of knowledge to draw from. The JWs can simply fill up that void with their propaganda. It's getting a lot harder for the JWs to recruit this type of person now because information is available much more readily. In the 70s and 80s it took a trip to the library or a christian bookstore to get your hands on any material critical of the Witnesses, and there wasn't a whole lot of it. Now, it's abundant and available instantenously on the internet. These potential recruits can fill up that knowledge gap in a few hours simply with a computer and an internet connection. It's not surprising then that the JWs growth, to the extent that there is growth, is coming from less developed lands where the internet is not widely available.
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Logic and the fallacy of 1914
by neverendingjourney inlogic dictates that to prove a conclusion you must break it down into its individual parts and prove each individual element.. for instance, i can prove that 2+2=4.
i can also prove that 4 - 1 = 3 and that 3+10= 13. therefore, i can definitely prove my conclusion that that 2+2-1+10=13.. however, i would be unable to prove that 2+z-1+10=13.
because one of the elements, z-1, is unverifiable.
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neverendingjourney
Thanks for making my illustration clearer, M.J. My field doesn't involve mathematics. It does, however, involve a good amount of writing and logic. I committed my thoughts to writing pretty quickly after spending some time meditating about the dishonest way the Society goes about arriving at its 1914 doctrine. I might have been able to express my thoughts in mathematical terms a bit more clearly had it not been so long since I sat in an algebra classroom. Thanks, again, for your input.
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Logic and the fallacy of 1914
by neverendingjourney inlogic dictates that to prove a conclusion you must break it down into its individual parts and prove each individual element.. for instance, i can prove that 2+2=4.
i can also prove that 4 - 1 = 3 and that 3+10= 13. therefore, i can definitely prove my conclusion that that 2+2-1+10=13.. however, i would be unable to prove that 2+z-1+10=13.
because one of the elements, z-1, is unverifiable.
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neverendingjourney
I think I made a mistake by trying to explain my thoughts using a mathematical equation. It's apparently confusing, and I apologize. When we get to writing things down, we often know what we intend to say, but we don't always communicate it effectively. It frequently takes other people reviewing our own work to point out where it's unclear. I should have expressed my thoughts a little more clearly so that discussion did not evolve into mathematical arguments. However, let's not lose the forest for the trees.
I know algebra. Believe me, I sat through many torturous hours in school learning higher math. In pure mathematical terms, you are all right. The equation is solvable. You can use simple algebra to find out what the unknown variable is. Obviously, the variable z in that equation can only be a 2. You can use elementary algebra to figure that out. That, however, wasn't my point. What I'm saying is that you must verify each element before you can say that you've reached an accurate conclusion. If there is any step in the process of forming a conclusion which cannot be proven, you can never say that your conclusion is without a doubt accurate. That the point. Please understand that you can't use algebra to verify any of the Society's six assumptions listed above.
In developing the 1914 doctrine, the Society begins by assuming that Daniel Chapter 4 has a second fulfillment, and they build upon that assumption with several other unverifiable assumptions. They take all of these steps and claim to have arrived upon an accurate Bible truth. Using the Bible, you can't prove whether or not Daniel Chapter 4 does or does not have a second application. You can't definitely prove any of the other assumptions that they make along the way either. To undergo that process and conclude that you’ve arrived at an irrefutable Bible truth is illogical and goes against all good reason.
Maybe this example will help. I come home late in the day to realize that my house has been broken into. I start with the assumption that my neighbor, Fred, must have done it because he and I don't get along very well. I look at my watch and realize its 7:00 p.m. I conclude that Fred must have broken into my house no more than an hour ago because he gets off of work at 6:00 p.m. I then assume that he must have driven away in his grey Toyota Camry that he uses for work because he only owns two cars and his wife always uses the other one. I also know that Fred drives down the main interstate that passes through our hometown every day on his way to work, so I assume that he must have driven away on the same interstate that's he so intimately familiar with. Therefore, I conclude that Fred broke into my house between the hours of 6:00 p.m. and 7:00 p.m. and then drove away on the interstate in his grey Toyota Camry. I've arrived at a perfectly valid conclusion, right? I should call the cops and have them stop all grey Toyota Camry's on the interstate that are no further than an hour's drive from my home, shouldn’t I? Obviously, the answer to both questions is NO!
What I've come up with is a hypothesis. I haven't verified any of the elements that I used to arrive at my conclusion. Again, the point is that the Society has no reason to treat their 1914 doctrine as being undeniably correct. They treat the doctrine as truth and expect their followers to do the same. They demand that they make life’s most important decisions under the assumption that the end times began in 1914. This is dishonest and illogical. That's the point that I was attempting to get across. Sorry for the confusion.
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Learning to Think in Shades of Gray and other Colors Too
by flipper init seems to be hard when getting out of the witnesses for many to realize that nobody really knows about many things in life.
good and evil, what happens when we die.
those leaving the witnesses may see it as a big loss in not knowing, and some more than others go through a whole grieving loss process with denial, bargaining, anger, etc.
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neverendingjourney
Well said. The world would be a better place if more people took your advice.
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Associated Jehovahs Witnesses for Reform on Blood
by LtCmd.Lore inhttp://www.ajwrb.org/.
anyone heard of this group before?.
i just heard about them today on an episode of the skeptics guide to the universe.
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neverendingjourney
Yeah, I've heard about them, and I've visited their website once or twice before, but I haven't really studied them in depth. The stupidity of the JWs ban on blood transfusions is pretty apparent to me now, so I haven't had much of a desire to really study the issue in depth.
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Logic and the fallacy of 1914
by neverendingjourney inlogic dictates that to prove a conclusion you must break it down into its individual parts and prove each individual element.. for instance, i can prove that 2+2=4.
i can also prove that 4 - 1 = 3 and that 3+10= 13. therefore, i can definitely prove my conclusion that that 2+2-1+10=13.. however, i would be unable to prove that 2+z-1+10=13.
because one of the elements, z-1, is unverifiable.
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neverendingjourney
Farkel,
Given that you agree with my approach, I find your abrasive tone a bit perplexing, but perhaps I need to develop a thicker skin. I appreciate your work in showing JW doctrine for what it is: illogical nonsene. Thanks for taking the time to read and repond to my post.
NEJ
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Logic and the fallacy of 1914
by neverendingjourney inlogic dictates that to prove a conclusion you must break it down into its individual parts and prove each individual element.. for instance, i can prove that 2+2=4.
i can also prove that 4 - 1 = 3 and that 3+10= 13. therefore, i can definitely prove my conclusion that that 2+2-1+10=13.. however, i would be unable to prove that 2+z-1+10=13.
because one of the elements, z-1, is unverifiable.
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neverendingjourney
Farkel,
I'm not teaching math here. That should be readily apparent, but perhaps I didn't make that point clearly enough. I am using the concept of a math formula to represent how we go about reaching conclusions in every day life. For instance: There's a pot of boiling water on my stove. Boiling water has a very high temperature. Having my skin come in contact with surfaces that have a temperature approximating that of boiling water can lead to severe burns. All of these elements are verifiable. Conclusion: If I stick my finger in the water, I will burn my skin. In other words, a+b+c=d, a, b, and c being the elements, and d being my conclusion. I wasn't attempting to make a mathematical argument here. I wasn't teaching algebra. I was using the equation as a visual tool to get my point across.
Now that that's out of the way, would you like to share some constructive criticism or properly defend the JWs' 1914 doctrine, or are you content with making your point by attacking the form of my argument instead of its substance?