what started as news of a man and woman being found unconscious on a park bench 12 days ago is escalating into an international incident.. sergei skripal had worked as a double agent for british intelligence mi6 before he was discovered and imprisoned in russia in 2006. he was later flown to england as part of a spy-swap in 2010. on sunday 4th march he was discovered along with his 33 year old daughter yulia close to a shopping centre in salisbury.. since then the story has become increasingly bizarre.
a policeman who was first to attend the scene also became critically ill and remains in hospital.
government scientists at porton down have confirmed that the cause is a russian military-grade nerve agent novichok.
- There are a lot of killers. We have a lot of killers. Well, you think our country is so innocent?
- Our relationship with Russia has never been worse thanks to many years of U.K. foolishness and stupidity and now, the Rigged Witch Hunt!
Or, as popular blogger having connections with state security agencies wrote, there is no evidence of the suspects' involvement with military or intelligence after 2014. Maybe they are retired, or maybe they were set up by MI6, who knows?
the german government requires watchtower to publish their own demise.
any changes to congregations has to be published on their website.. https://www.jehovaszeugen.de/amtsblatt.44.0.html .
since 2006 321 congregations have been dissolved and merged into others.
- 300, not 321, congregations were merged
- During the same period, 194 new congregations were created
- In fact, we don't know whether all 135 KHs were sold. Some KHs could be rented (so they couldn't be sold), their methodology could be changed etc.
today's london times reports on the july ruling of the eu court that forces the organisation country to comply with data protection.. the action originated in finland but the ruling will affect every eu country.
the cult tried unsuccessfully to argue that the notes taken by jws in the door-to-door work were personal and not accessed by the congregation.
the court ruled that they are acting under the auspices of the congregation and therefore they must comply with data-protection laws.. keeping lists of do-not-calls also falls under this ruling.. why does the cult always feel that it is above the law?.
Listener
From my understanding of the legislation, if you wish to make a record regarding someone then you must get their permission. If you don't want to get their permission then making records about another person is none of your business.
This is true only in relation to sensitive data (i.e. revealing racial or ethnic origin, political opinions, religious or philosophical beliefs, concerning health, sex life or sexual orientation etc.). Processing of other personal data, according to art. 6(1)(f) of GDPR, is allowed without consent of the data subject when "processing is necessary for the purposes of the legitimate interests pursued by the controller or by a third party, except where such interests are overridden by the interests or fundamental rights and freedoms of the data subject". Taking into account that The Article 29 Working Party mentioned exercise of the right to freedom of expression or information, conventional direct marketing, and unsolicited non-commercial messages, including for political campaigns or charitable fundraising, as possibly being legitimate purposes of data processing (Opinion 06/2014, p. 25), it will likely be necessary for national supervisory authorities (aka departments of 'it depends') and courts, CJEU and other national and international bodies to determine whether and to what extent this provision is applicable to JW door-to-door ministry and similar activities (e.g., political canvassing).
carla
The public should know that potential pedophiles are knocking on their doors and keeping records about their home and members of their family.
Preaching JWs are no more potential pedophiles than anyone's relatives, friends, neighbors etc. The org's mishandling of CSA doesn't justify portraying adherents of the religion as dangerous criminals and incitement of moral panic.
At the end of 2007 there were nearly 2225 congregations in Germany (see 2008 Yearbook). Since 530 out of them were foreign-language (FLC), ≈1700 were ones German-language (GLC). Notices of creation, renaming and dissolution of congregations are published in Amtsblatt. Thanks to this, it is possible to count that the number of GLC has decreased by ≈210 whereas the number of FLC has increased by ≈90 over the past decade. So, now there ≈1490 GLC and ≈620 FLC.
I have only a quote from Watchtower Library - Deutsch (available on jw.org):
*** km 2/08 S. 7 Können wir den veränderten Bedarf im Gebiet berücksichtigen? ***
In den letzten Jahrzehnten sind viele Menschen aus den verschiedensten Ländern in unser Land gekommen und haben hier die Wahrheit kennengelernt. Jehova hat seinen Segen ausgegossen, sodass als Ergebnis heute 531 Versammlungen und 272 Gruppen in 30 Sprachen existieren. Insgesamt sind über 36 000 Verkündiger im fremdsprachigen Gebiet tätig. In Arabisch, Chinesisch, Türkisch und Vietnamesisch gibt es noch Bedarf; an einigen Orten auch in Deutscher Gebärdensprache, Persisch, Polnisch, Tamil und Tigrinja.
Google translate:
In the last decades, many people from different countries came to our country and got to know the truth here. Jehovah has poured out his blessing, resulting in 531 congregations and 272 groups in 30 languages today. In total, more than 36,000 publishers work in foreign-language areas. In Arabic, Chinese, Turkish and Vietnamese there is still need; in some places also in German Sign Language, Persian, Polish, Tamil and Tigrinja.
today's london times reports on the july ruling of the eu court that forces the organisation country to comply with data protection.. the action originated in finland but the ruling will affect every eu country.
the cult tried unsuccessfully to argue that the notes taken by jws in the door-to-door work were personal and not accessed by the congregation.
the court ruled that they are acting under the auspices of the congregation and therefore they must comply with data-protection laws.. keeping lists of do-not-calls also falls under this ruling.. why does the cult always feel that it is above the law?.
Adam Chapman (Kingsley Napley, Partner and Head of Public Law Department) described the CJEU's approach as "maximalist, and probably to many people a counter-intuitive". "The obvious and immediate consequence of the two [on Facebook pages and D2D note-keeping] decisions is that a considerable number of organisations which, up until now, had not considered themselves to be joint data controllers will have to review that assessment", he added.
Another interesting legal blogs:
CJEU rules on joint controllership - what does this mean for companies?
Bitterly disappointing. To spend 10 minutes talking in platitudes about two simple facts - and to fail to mention the number of created congregations and distribution of merged and created ones by language (not to mention that the correct number of mergers is 300, not 321). Remember, it was always possible to know how the number of congregations changed since these figures were published in Yearbooks (now in annual reports). The really interesting fact is that the number of German-language congregations has reduced by 1/8 during the past decade (compare the data from 2009 Yearbook, Amtsblatt, and German February 2008 Kingdom Ministry (p. 7)) - whereas the number of foreign-language ones grew and now they make up nearly 30% of all German congregations.
ok so this is a topic i've pondered and go back and forth on.. i can easily see a point where lawsuits cause massive deficits in the organization.
honestly i feel like we are seeing the tip of the iceberg in regards to lawsuits on child abuse.
to me it looks like the property sell offs are to be able to get ready for this.
There are also interesting income data from 2016 Australian census: https://www.jehovahs-witness.com/topic/5704887365009408/aust-census-incomes-jws-falling-further-behind
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1ngiBqNs3fk9XgxYFfTrv9acCKi5LWZnbysIAQ1_2wnY/edit?usp=sharing
ok so this is a topic i've pondered and go back and forth on.. i can easily see a point where lawsuits cause massive deficits in the organization.
honestly i feel like we are seeing the tip of the iceberg in regards to lawsuits on child abuse.
to me it looks like the property sell offs are to be able to get ready for this.
The most recent (AFAIK) data from 2014 U.S. Religious Landscape Study are really awful.
http://www.pewforum.org/religious-landscape-study/religious-tradition/jehovahs-witness/
On other hand, the margin of error is nearly +/- 8.5 percentage points (Report, p. 93, 96).
As to the question, it was:
Last year, that is in 2013, what was your total family income from all sources, before taxes? (Report, p. 195)
what started as news of a man and woman being found unconscious on a park bench 12 days ago is escalating into an international incident.. sergei skripal had worked as a double agent for british intelligence mi6 before he was discovered and imprisoned in russia in 2006. he was later flown to england as part of a spy-swap in 2010. on sunday 4th march he was discovered along with his 33 year old daughter yulia close to a shopping centre in salisbury.. since then the story has become increasingly bizarre.
a policeman who was first to attend the scene also became critically ill and remains in hospital.
government scientists at porton down have confirmed that the cause is a russian military-grade nerve agent novichok.
Just for the record.
Thus far, the suspects' identities were revealed.
A Russian active measures agency aka RT/Russia Today/Sputnik presented the most ridiculous version ever: the men are businessmen (without biographies or relatives, friends, neighbors, clients or anyone else who would sell info to newspapers) who spend entire weekend just to see the Salisbury Cathedral.
It was revealed that, inter alia:
the suspects' passport dossiers contain "top-secret" markings;
a man having similar passport was involved in the 2016 coup plot in Montenegro;
some persons with similar passports indicated on different documents that their home address was 76B Khoroshevskoe Highway - GRU’s Moscow HQ.
Wondering what Russia apologists think about this.
Links:
https://meduza.io/en/feature/2018/09/23/yeah-it-s-the-gru-hq-so-what
