Posts by StephaneLaliberte

48

Marc O'Donell's statement: Lloyd and the conflict of Interest

by Diogenesister in

as expected from a man who prioritizes the most vulnerable members of our community, marc has made a sober statement that explains why there's a deep conflict of interest between lloyds recent behaviour and the work they do at jw watch.

you can read it here:.

public statement of mark o’donnell.

StephaneLaliberte

I told you it wasn't open for debate. You since posted twice advocating that there's nothing wrong with a 30 year old man having sex with a 14 year old girl.

One thing Nitty-Gritty said that caught my attention is that its not illegal in Germany. Here is what Wikipedia states on this, siting Germany's criminal code from 2012:

The age of consent in Germany is 14, as long as a person over the age of 21 does not exploit a 14- to 15-year-old person's lack of capacity for sexual self-determination, in which case a conviction of an individual over the age of 21 requires a complaint from the younger individual;

I have to say that I find this sickening. From where I stand, I think Canada has it right. You go by age difference.

In May 2008, the Canadian government passed a bill to raise the age of consent from 14 to 16, while creating a close-in-age exemption for sex between 14–15 year olds and partners less than 5 years older, and keeping an existing close-in-age clause for sex between 12–13 year olds and partners less than 2 years older.[3]

I don't believe laws should be a barometer for morality. Regardless of what Germany thinks, a 30 year old trying to get it on with a 14 year old is sickening.

48

Marc O'Donell's statement: Lloyd and the conflict of Interest

by Diogenesister in

as expected from a man who prioritizes the most vulnerable members of our community, marc has made a sober statement that explains why there's a deep conflict of interest between lloyds recent behaviour and the work they do at jw watch.

you can read it here:.

public statement of mark o’donnell.

StephaneLaliberte

Disclaimer: This is not a comment about Lloyd, I don't know about Lloyd's history.

How bad is it for an adult male to fool around with a 14 year old. Well, its bad. Real bad. Like prison bad.

Now, there is the law and there is my opinion on morality. What I mean is, lets be honest, its generally not as bad as an adult having intercourse with prepubescent kids. For instance, I'd imagine I'd be fine with the death sentence for such pedophiles. But would I order the death of someone who fell in love with a teenager that never felt aggressed? I'd send him to jail for a year, but death? These cases can vary significantly from one victim to the next and this is why the law generally has rules such as sentencing from 1 year to 15 years, leaving the judge to decide.

Point is, I understand that Nitty Gritty is seeing a difference in the severity of the crime, but lets be clear here: getting it on with a teenager is still a crime.

9

Australia's Religious Discrimination Act.

by fulltimestudent in

jw
friends

this is an interesting and intriguing new law (or, it will be if enacted in its present form).. quote: "the proposed new religious discrimination act is intended to prevent a person from being discriminated against on the basis of their religion.".

fair enough, but to get it through the house of representatives last night, the government accepted some changes.. the first draft (discussed last night) had a clause that may have impacted the rights of some gay and/or trans-sexual students at religious schools by allowing a religious school to expel such a student.

last night the government was forced to accept changes that removed that possibility.

StephaneLaliberte

I agree with Simon. Government shouldn't interfere there.

Where I disagree with Simon is that the Government should try to do something about the fact that groups preach people to shun the disfellowshipped ones and threaten their members with the same treatment if they don't do as they're told.

In any case, I don't believe this ruling would have any impact on the JWs. They don't allow heterosexuals to engage in sexual activities outside of marriage. Many heterosexuals in that religion are unable to find a mate and , as a result, end up spending the majority of their lives, if not its entirety, sexually repressed. Same goes with homosexuals. They are, by their teachings, condemned to the same lives as the heterosexuals who are unable to find a mate.

Sure, we all know this results in homophobia in the group and all, but their official teaching as it stands would likely hold in court.

24

Freaky, unsettling, unnerving comment from Losch in his AGM talk

by FFGhost in

did anybody else catch it?.

he said that people who come back in the earthly resurrection would be given a body "reasonably similar" to the one they had prior to death.. what the almighty hootch?.

"similar"?.

StephaneLaliberte

I assume that if I have a small d*ck, I'd expect to wake up with 7 inches. Or if I were a women, I'd expect to wake up with a "C-Cup" pair. You know, reasonably similar body with small improvements.

11530

It's been a long 9 years Lloyd Evans / John Cedars

by Newly Enlightened in

original reddit post (removed).

StephaneLaliberte

And now his Patreon donations are going towards legal fees.

Just like the WT! HAHAHAHHHHAHHAHAHAHA

24

Simon, are you affected by this Canadian trucker convoy?

by greenhornet in

jw
friends

i think you live in canada.

this convoy is starting in the usa and soon to be in europe.

just like to know how this is effecting your daily life and like to share with us if it is.

StephaneLaliberte

This is something I explained to my kid yesterday.... you think you live in a complete democracy... think again. Only 5.5 million Canadians actually voted for Trudeau at the last elections. And I don't remember him making any promises to force people to get vaccinated by threatening their jobs.

11530

It's been a long 9 years Lloyd Evans / John Cedars

by Newly Enlightened in

original reddit post (removed).

StephaneLaliberte

Not only does he take photos ( isn't your memory a good enough storage unit ), stores his photos in an iPhone ( where your wife can find and flip through the incriminating evidence). He boasts about his exploits to a lawyer believing that she would be proud of his trip ( ''Lloyd, she's beautiful...hope you enjoyed your time together, even though you have a wife and two children ). Then, stupidly makes a 1 hour 39 minute video admitting his exploits on a video board, where...''anything you say maybe used against you''!

From the movie Red Dragon, FBI Agent Will Graham discussing with Dr. Lector

Dr. Lector: Then, by implication, you think, you're smarter than I am... since it was you who caught me.

Will Graham: I know I'm not smarter than you.

Dr. Lector: Then how did you catch me?

Will Graham: You had disadvantages.

Dr. Lector: What disadvantages?

Will Graham: You're insane.

36

Where do we go from here, the Lloyd-gate?

by raymond frantz in

the problem is where do we go from here?

lloyd is not going to go away , he has too much to loose(money) neither will his followers go as we have seen the last few days there was hardly a drop to his membership .so what's next?

we will be branded in the same colours and because of him we won't be taken seriously anymore.

StephaneLaliberte

To be honest, I don't know. I very much liked his videos as I felt they kept me up to date with a religion that my parents still practice. I'd be able to get a whole lot of information while cleaning my dishes for instance.

So, now, perhaps I should take this as an opportunity to lower my xjw intake and move on with my life. Perhaps I shouldn't care as much as I do about my parent's beliefs. I don't know.

One thing for sure though, I'll ignore John and anyone supporting him. And lets not confuse things here. This isn't the same as shunning. This is about taking an active part in a public social cause and as such I can pick and choose.

Again, if I ran into Lloyd "in real life", I'd gladly talk with him and very likely try to convince him to also move on with his life to other things. But I'm not going to encourage that fool by counting my clicks or my views on his online activism.

26

Watchtower Study: How Strong Will Your Faith Be?

by RULES & REGULATIONS in

the watchtower—study edition | november 2021. study article 47. how strong will your faith be?.

16 note the example of geydi, a sister from guatemala.

her husband, edi, was murdered as they were returning home from a congregation meeting.

StephaneLaliberte

I see a lot of negative speculation in this thread , not based on facts. In the example given , the bereaved widow finds support and comfort in her faith. This could be said of any Christian Church and has been widely attested by many people. She also found support from her friends and social network, again a common experience

When my sister passed away, I kept attending meetings and found lots of encouragements with many of my friends there. It was my friends that were a source of encouragement. Conversely, the religion itself was anything but encouraging.

A ministerial servant at the Kingdom Hall, told me that being "far from Jehovah results only in death". He passed that remark as he knew that my sister was disfellowshipped at the time of her death. Until that day, I didn’t know I could actually be hurt by words.
Many brothers and sisters believed that my sister would not be resurrected and shared this with me.
Two elders came to my house for a shepherding call and told me not to use my sister's death as an excuse to talk to my mother who was also disfellowshipped at the time.
I had to conduct the funeral service as none of my JWs friends felt comfortable to do it.

This shows that in the end, I found comfort in my friends - not the religion. As my friends were Jehovah’s Witnesses, the religion claimed glory for their good deeds. Still, religion had nothing to do with it, it was friendship. This can easily be demonstrated by the fact that my non-jws friends have provided plenty of comfort in various difficult situations once I had left the religion.

11530

It's been a long 9 years Lloyd Evans / John Cedars

by Newly Enlightened in

original reddit post (removed).

StephaneLaliberte

4 pages of comments...seriously ???, And one more self righteous than the next....the mob mentality taking place here is textbook...Geeez...let go of your pearls ladies and give it a rest.

The reality is that we are all hurt by this. First and foremost, we all very deeply care about activism against the leaders of the Jehovah’s Witnesses. They inflict harm through their teachings and they show a phony morality that alters based on what’s in it for them. And now, one of our most popular, well mannered, well articulated online activists has shown to be as phony as they are. He was chastising the Jehovah’s Witnesses for their permissiveness towards sexual abuse while providing funds (by paying for prostitution) to criminal organizations that directly abuse many more children and women.

We are all hurt by this. I spend the entire day yesterday thinking about it and I’m still on this page this morning. It hurts. Lloyd’s actions have hurt his family, his friends and the entire EX-JW community which I’ve been a part of for the last 15 years.

And we’re not supposed to talk about it???

All this talking, this expression of our feelings, emotions, trying to understand what the hell just happened, this isn’t us being “hatters”. We’ve been betrayed by a guy who claimed that one of the most important things in his life was to help this community.

Believe it or not, if I happened to see Lloyd in a restaurant, I wouldn’t mind having a beer with him and talk about the “good times” when he was doing so well. I don’t harbor hate towards this guy. Shunning is something the JWs do and to which I am very much opposed. But there is NO WAY he can keep representing any of us with what he did. Anything he tries to do to help the EX-JW community will fall back on how phony he’s been for several years and will result in discrediting him and the cause he’s trying to push forward.

That doesn’t mean there is no redemption for Lloyd. There are men who did very bad things to their first wives, learned from their mistakes, and became good husbands to their second wives. Lets hope he’s learn from his mistakes and do better with his next marriage and social causes. Regardless, he can no longer represent our community.