Posts by Chaserious

47

Should Employers be WARNED about Jehovahs Witnesses

by BlindersOff1 in

any gov agency or private company that has private personal info of customers/clients should be aware.

its common knowledge to long time witnesses that jws will violate customer privacy laws and rules when they see something a customer does or buys that they think jw congregation elders should know about .

thats right they will spy for the elders.. .

Chaserious

Given that JW employers are allowed to massively discriminate against worldly people in employment, why shouldn't worldly people be allowed to balance

things out by discriminating in favor of worldly people?

You've said this several times in this thread, but it's not correct. You seem to be referring to JW owned companies that only hire other witnesses. Mormons and other insular type religions have small business owners that do this too. In reality, what they are doing is hiring from their circle of friends and acquaintences and people their friends and acquaintences reccommend. Because all of their friends are JWs, you can't really separate the two. And it's not illegal to hire only people you know that you or have a mutual friend with. Now if they advertized the job and had a lot of people come in to interview and only hire the JWs, because they are JWs, that would be illegal. But I never knew any JW owned business to do that. When they want to hire someone, they just put the word out. They don't put it on monster.com

On the other hand, I don't even know how you would implement what you are suggesting about warning employers, if one could get past how offensive it is. It is illegal to ask someone what religion they belong to in employment applications or interviews. So how would they even know? If anyone asked me what religion I belonged to on a job interview, I would walk out of the interview immediately and report them.

4

Can one sue the WT for Defamation, not hate speech.

by jam in

jw
friends

defamation is communication about a person that tends to.

hurt the person,s reputation.

defamation is a strict liability tort,.

Chaserious

Yes - if the WT prints your name in their literature and makes specific false statements about you, you should go see a lawyer. Olin Moyle did it. Otherwise I wouldn't waste my time.

10

200 Billion WT Corporation gives all Members Vote, then Distributes all Money to Members

by villagegirl in

the plan: the wt corp turns 200 billion dollar $ assets, property, stock, investment, into cash, then sends a check to every member, men women and baptized children.

these people are 7 million in number and now each get a check for $30,000 x 7 million = $200 billion.

the governing body quietly leaves town.

Chaserious

I'll post here when mine shows up. Where does $200 billion come from, btw?

13

Canadian Atheists: Religious-freedom Office, WTF!?

by aposta-Z in

this is 50 million of tax payer money that should go somewhere else.. see this is why i as a quebecois want to separate.

it is beyond a language issue.. .

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/ottawa-notebook/religious-freedom-office-shows-lack-of-conservative-hidden-agenda/article8822804/ .

Chaserious

I'm not Canadian, but this doesn't seem like a big deal. Protecting freedom of religion seems like a legitimate role for government, although I understand the concern with whether it will be administered to favor only certain religions. Compare the $5M to the billions that the U.S. Office of Faith-Based Initiatives has spent. Even though it's for humanitarian efforts, it's all funneled through religious groups.

28

Has anyone heard anything about Elders being a separate entity and WTS not helping them in court cases legally?

by Newly Enlightened in

i just heard a rumor and trying to verify it.

a current jw just told us that the elder's are now a separate entity and that when brought into court hearings and they try to use the 'clergy confidentiality clause' that the wtbt$ backs off and says the elders are their own separate entity.. anyone heard anything like this?.

Chaserious

Thanks for the kind words, Arboles. I'll check out that book!

28

Has anyone heard anything about Elders being a separate entity and WTS not helping them in court cases legally?

by Newly Enlightened in

i just heard a rumor and trying to verify it.

a current jw just told us that the elder's are now a separate entity and that when brought into court hearings and they try to use the 'clergy confidentiality clause' that the wtbt$ backs off and says the elders are their own separate entity.. anyone heard anything like this?.

Chaserious

Thanks, Arboles. Interesting outcome with the slander lawsuit. I have decided what practice area I'm going into, but since it's somewhat narrow, I'd rather not get more specific publicly than saying that it's within the realm of litigation. The first year was definitely tough, although I think some people blow it out of proportion with how hard it is. I would say that on average, I spent about 20 hours a week reading and studying, in addition to the 15 hours spent in class. However, during periods leading up to finals or before legal writing papers were due, the 20 hours became more like 40-50.

I do serve on the editing staff of one of the law journals at my school, and actually was fortunate enough to have an article (or a "comment" as they call them when student-written) that I wrote published. It's really not all that glamorous - when you get offered journal or law review membership, most of your time is spent editing, not writing. And even if you do get something published, except in rare cases, hardly anybody will ever read it - it's not like being published in the N.Y. Times or anything!

28

Has anyone heard anything about Elders being a separate entity and WTS not helping them in court cases legally?

by Newly Enlightened in

i just heard a rumor and trying to verify it.

a current jw just told us that the elder's are now a separate entity and that when brought into court hearings and they try to use the 'clergy confidentiality clause' that the wtbt$ backs off and says the elders are their own separate entity.. anyone heard anything like this?.

Chaserious

ArbolesdeArabia - Yes, I'm graduating from law school this spring. So what happened with the brother who sued for slander? Did they announce his disfellowshipping anyway? My feeling is that they generally defend elders and congregations when it is their own policy/doctrine being attacked, like a general attack against the blood doctrine or disfellowshipping, but not when it's a result of elders following routine orders or making business decisions that middle managers just have to make sometimes, where in society in general one would expect their employer to come to their defense.

19

What Could Cause the Watch Tower Corporation to Loose Its Non Profit Tax Status?

by frankiespeakin in

just throwing this idea out in hyperspace to see what comes up..

Chaserious

Chas, good points so maybe a bunch of child molestations lawsuit that they loose in court, might be the thing that causes them to loose tax exempt

status

No, I don't think that would be the trigger. Federal law allows all religious organizations and churches to get 501(c) (tax exempt) statuts. The IRS can't revoke the status because they don't think an organization is "deserving." It would take a change in federal law to make additional requirements to keep the 501(c) status. As I mentioned, there is not going to be political support anytime soon for this kind of change. I doubt you could find 5% of members of Congress who are in any way interested in picking and choosing what religions get the tax exemption (or eliminating it all together), much less any kind of majority. There is too much risk (being labelled as "war on religion", etc) and not enough public support. Plus there is a significant risk that if they change the law to favor some religions and not others, it could be invalidated as unconstitutional.

It would be far more likely to be some kind of financial wrongdoing that could bring a change about. Things like enriching insiders, private benefit, political activity, not paying taxes on unrelated business income, and other financial wrongdoing are all part of the already existing law that nonprofits must follow and can get in trouble for not complying with. I don't know how much of this is going on, if any, and what the chances are of airing it publicly, but it's just so much more likely because it wouldn't require passage of new laws.

16

At what point do the individuals in the ORG need to take responsibility for their actions?

by vajeni82 in

so, i'm sitting here, being pissed about my family.

both of my parents and my only sister are jws.

i haven't had a relationship with them since they i left in 2002.

Chaserious

I don't blame you. I feel the same way about my family. I know of other parents who play a little loose with the DF rules and my family doesn't. So, not only do they choose to follow the policy but they follow it strictly, and that's on them.

I feel pity for them in a sense, in that they let such an organization cause them to sever normal human family ties and lose out on a relationship with their son for no other reason than not agreeing on religious doctrine, but I hold them just as responsible too. Some things are just natural -like loving your family - and you shouldn't need anyone else to tell you that it's okay or not okay.

19

What Could Cause the Watch Tower Corporation to Loose Its Non Profit Tax Status?

by frankiespeakin in

just throwing this idea out in hyperspace to see what comes up..

Chaserious

To me this is very political in its nature even though the government they support and tell other to support is only in their imagination it still opposes the

right of a country to get it citizens to bear arms in its defence, a very serious political stand.

Maybe, but as long as the federal goverment is not going after churches that explicitly call for election of certain politicians from the pulpit they are not going to go after anti-military religions. They'd probably have to go after the Quakers and Amish too if that was the basis. As long as Westboro Baptist Church still has tax free status despite hateful and much more overtly political speech than the WTS spouts, the WTS status is not going anywhere.

I don't discourage people from petitioning their member of Congress about this or any other issue they feel strongly about, but that is unlikely to be the way this kind of thing would happen. There is little to no political capital to be gained from such a move. People in general just don't care much, and there is always the risk that some voters would wonder if their church is next. If they did get a little too greedy and some fraudulent conduct could be shown, that would be a more likely trigger. Even then, I suspect they would try to somehow find a "fall guy" to take the hit and carry on unscathed.