Posts by Chaserious

10

Anyone from New Hampshire? Do JWs object to the license plate??

by Chaserious in

i happened to come across this case today: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wooley_v._maynard.

"george maynard and his wife, followers of the jehovah's witnesses faith, viewed the motto as repugnant to their moral, religious, and political beliefs, and for this reason they covered up the motto [live free or die] on the license plates of their jointly owned family automobiles.".

it appears this guy kept getting fined by the local cops for covering up the license plate motto!

Chaserious

Thanks Neon, interesting to hear. I suspected it wasn't an official rule. As if they need all JWs covering up part of their license plates in case they didn't look like enough of a cult already.

Ding: I am guessing that his objection was that the motto implies that rather than give up your liberty, we are willing to fight in the military and die for our freedom, which he wouldn't be willing to do (ironic, since that freedom gave him the right to act like a weirdo and get the Supreme Court to approve it). Although I did a search on him after I posted and found a follow up story on the plaintiff by some newspaper, and when he moved to Connecticut, he also covered up the part that says "The Constitution State." So maybe he was just a nut.

10

Anyone from New Hampshire? Do JWs object to the license plate??

by Chaserious in

i happened to come across this case today: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wooley_v._maynard.

"george maynard and his wife, followers of the jehovah's witnesses faith, viewed the motto as repugnant to their moral, religious, and political beliefs, and for this reason they covered up the motto [live free or die] on the license plates of their jointly owned family automobiles.".

it appears this guy kept getting fined by the local cops for covering up the license plate motto!

Chaserious

I happened to come across this case today: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wooley_v._Maynard

" George Maynard and his wife, followers of the Jehovah's Witnesses faith, viewed the motto as repugnant to their moral, religious, and political beliefs, and for this reason they covered up the motto [Live Free or Die] on the license plates of their jointly owned family automobiles."

It appears this guy kept getting fined by the local cops for covering up the license plate motto! I'm not from anywhere near NH, and also this happened back in the 1970's, but I never heard of anything like this. Was this an official witness rule? Or was this guy just one of those whack-a-doodles that every congregation has a couple of who make up their own rules that are even more restrictive than the WTS rules, and say it's because they are witnesses? Seems pretty bizarre. Are there other state mottos that are "worldly"? Turns out the Supreme Court said he could cover it up if he wanted without getting fined

19

List Of Names Of Legal Dept at Bethel?

by frankiespeakin in

it would be nice to know any info would be helpful..

Chaserious

I noticed that, 144,001, as well as the fact that the lawyer from Jackson Lewis has represented them in a number of other cases. It appears he might be one of their "go-to" outside attorneys. Jackson Lewis specializes in employment law, which often involves argument to the effect of "what that guy did might have been bad, but he wasn't representing us when he did it," which I suppose is an argument they need to make frequently when people want to hold them liable for the acts of various individual members, including the Conti case.

19

List Of Names Of Legal Dept at Bethel?

by frankiespeakin in

it would be nice to know any info would be helpful..

Chaserious

Also: It looks like a few of the guys from 2003 have moved on to private practice:

http://www.mandellawfirm.com/Attorney-Profiles/Donald-T-Ridley.shtml

A fine example of humility on Brother Ridley's part in writing his bio, BTW. " When the chips are down and the wolves are closing in, there's no one better to have in your corner than Don Ridley." I guess after years of having wolves for clients, he knows all the tricks on warding them off!

http://www.aglinett.com/attorneys/index.php

http://custerlaw.net/bio.html

I imagine if you leave Bethel and join a local congregation somewhere you could have a fairly lucrative general private practice as an attorney. Between the lack of witness lawyers and the prestige of having been a "Bethel lawyer, these guys can probably snag every JW car wreck, worker's comp case, will, real estate closing, custody case, SSA dispute, and small business incorporation for every witness within 50 miles.

29

Watch Tower Publishing Literature To Incite Hatred Towards All Religions, All Earthly Government, And People Not Jehovah Witnesses

by frankiespeakin in

now i know that there are some here that can supply plenty of documented proof as to the hatred inciting teachings of the past presidents and the now rulling governing body in the literature they export world wide.. any former member who has changed his mind and no longer excepts these hate inspireing teachings of the governing body is labeled "mentally diseased" meaning these people are to be avoided because they have a catchy mental malfunction that is deadly.. all governments are controlled by an invisible master mind who has only evil intentions and is leading the vast majority of the human race to thier destruction.

and thier followers are encouraged to hate what jehovah hates and jehovah hates all the governments of the earth includeing isreal and even the united nations of which they are members as an ngo.. in russia thier literature is rightly ban because it is reccognized as hatred inspireing.

(no shit sherlock!).

Chaserious

Fair enough, Frankie. My misunderstanding. I did think the scientology case was interesting. I hadn't read that one before.

29

Watch Tower Publishing Literature To Incite Hatred Towards All Religions, All Earthly Government, And People Not Jehovah Witnesses

by frankiespeakin in

now i know that there are some here that can supply plenty of documented proof as to the hatred inciting teachings of the past presidents and the now rulling governing body in the literature they export world wide.. any former member who has changed his mind and no longer excepts these hate inspireing teachings of the governing body is labeled "mentally diseased" meaning these people are to be avoided because they have a catchy mental malfunction that is deadly.. all governments are controlled by an invisible master mind who has only evil intentions and is leading the vast majority of the human race to thier destruction.

and thier followers are encouraged to hate what jehovah hates and jehovah hates all the governments of the earth includeing isreal and even the united nations of which they are members as an ngo.. in russia thier literature is rightly ban because it is reccognized as hatred inspireing.

(no shit sherlock!).

Chaserious

Frankie,

You seem like a nice guy, but I'm not going to continue with detailed responses because you clearly will think you're right about the law no matter what. I imagine in another dimension, this quality would make you a good regular pioneer. My only question is whether you think that what you copied and pasted from Wikipedia proves that you are correct that the WTS shunning policy is breaking the law? Because it doesn't; in fact it does quite the opposite.

-Chas

22

Why are the Jehovah's Witnesses not allowed to carry a weapon (for protection) during field service?

by I_love_Jeff in

if jesus allowed peter to carry a sword for protection, why are the jehovah's witnesses against carry a weapon during their "fun" door-to-door adventuring?

it seems jesus did not mind that peter carried a sword if we read luke 22:36-38. is it another case of picking and choosing what works for their man-made doctrine?.

is defending oneself a violent act, according to the jehovah's witnesses?

Chaserious

Good way to respond to a "conversation stopper"

42

Modern-day Noah rebuilding Ark in Maryland

by Simon in

this hillarious.. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-20649021.

"i am just like noah," greene says.

"they're laughing and mocking just like they did noah.

Chaserious

I visited the area about 10 years ago and saw it. All of the local dubs made fun of him for wasting so much time on it.

29

Watch Tower Publishing Literature To Incite Hatred Towards All Religions, All Earthly Government, And People Not Jehovah Witnesses

by frankiespeakin in

now i know that there are some here that can supply plenty of documented proof as to the hatred inciting teachings of the past presidents and the now rulling governing body in the literature they export world wide.. any former member who has changed his mind and no longer excepts these hate inspireing teachings of the governing body is labeled "mentally diseased" meaning these people are to be avoided because they have a catchy mental malfunction that is deadly.. all governments are controlled by an invisible master mind who has only evil intentions and is leading the vast majority of the human race to thier destruction.

and thier followers are encouraged to hate what jehovah hates and jehovah hates all the governments of the earth includeing isreal and even the united nations of which they are members as an ngo.. in russia thier literature is rightly ban because it is reccognized as hatred inspireing.

(no shit sherlock!).

Chaserious

That's a good point, James. The ACLU always takes the anti-religion stance if you will, when it comes to establishment clause cases, such as school prayer, ten commandments displays, and nativity scenes on gov't property. But when it comes to free exercise cases, they tend to side with minority religious groups, like the WTS. According to one of my former professors who is an expert in the Church and State field, they started takes these types of cases in the 1930's and 40's to combat the charge that they were anti-religion, especially in the Red Scare era where that was connected with being a "commie", and that's how they ended up being such strange bedfellows with Rutherford.

In any event, they certainly wouldn't take a garden varierty shunning case with no other allegations. It isn't really even a free exercise case. It would be brought as a regular state tort law case, which was the posture of the Paul v. Watchtower case over shunning, which was the most high profile WTS litigation over the DF policy. The 1st Amendment doesn't really enter the case except as a defense by the WTS.

29

Watch Tower Publishing Literature To Incite Hatred Towards All Religions, All Earthly Government, And People Not Jehovah Witnesses

by frankiespeakin in

now i know that there are some here that can supply plenty of documented proof as to the hatred inciting teachings of the past presidents and the now rulling governing body in the literature they export world wide.. any former member who has changed his mind and no longer excepts these hate inspireing teachings of the governing body is labeled "mentally diseased" meaning these people are to be avoided because they have a catchy mental malfunction that is deadly.. all governments are controlled by an invisible master mind who has only evil intentions and is leading the vast majority of the human race to thier destruction.

and thier followers are encouraged to hate what jehovah hates and jehovah hates all the governments of the earth includeing isreal and even the united nations of which they are members as an ngo.. in russia thier literature is rightly ban because it is reccognized as hatred inspireing.

(no shit sherlock!).

Chaserious

Frankie,

They are absolutely not in violation of existing religious freedom laws in the U.S. Whether or not you think the constitution should be changed so that they are, you and I will evidently disagree on, but U.S. courts have time and again upheld the rights of religious organizations such as the JWs, Amish, Mormons, etc to shun people. I can cite the cases if you aren't convinced. We are guaranteed two rights by the constitution in respect to religion - the right to be free from government-established religion, and the right to free exercise of religion. If some people want to exercise their religion by shunning others, that is their right in a free society. It's contemptible, but it doesn't interfere with YOUR right of free exercise. The WTS is not holding a gun to anyone's head and forcing them to shun. If someone doesn't want to shun, they can use their own free exercise rights and leave the religion too.

You haven't addressed by earlier comparison. Yes, the WTS says apostates are worthy of a death sentence. But the Catholic Church says those who disown the Church and oppose it will go to hell. Isn't that worse? Do you want to ban them too?

-Chas