It is good . They are proceeding slowly & carefully . When their report comes it will be all the tighter and harder to challenge.
Power to their elbow!
UK Charity Commission - Latest
by Slidin Fast 19 Replies latest watchtower child-abuse
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pepperheart
This is good news
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Ruby456
Simon, yes I agree but I see that as being part of a desire to protect their patriarchy in that it goes all the way to being God ordained and spirit directed. In fact the royal commission report highlights the patriarchal nature of the org
anyways I'm re-reading case 29 from the Royal Commission - and I applaud the Charity Commission for homing in on what is relevant to the UK.
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Ruby456
okay this may apply to Australia (p.69) but does it apply here?
under precautionary measures that Jehovahs witnesses have in place
• If an individual has been identified as a ‘predator’, congregational elders may meet with parents of children in the congregation and warn them about the individual.616
• A perpetrator of child sexual abuse should preferably not be appointed or reappointed to a position of authority within the organisation unless 20 years has passed since the incident of abuse, although a possible exception to this is if the abuse occurred before the perpetrator was baptised as a Jehovah’s Witness. -
Ruby456
simon here is some proof re protecting their patriarchy and their motive - bolding mine. But I also agree with what you said.
re motive - there were only two elders in this particular congregation and one of them was the accused - Bill Neil. imo the CO and Mr. Horley (the other elder) were mainly concerned with how quickly they could re-appoint him.
Sufficiency of evidence
Mr Doug Jackson agreed that the purpose of the meetings with BCB and Bill Neill was to establish the truth of BCB’s allegation in accordance with the Jehovah’s Witness organisation’s scriptural standards of proof as described in section 3. Mr Horley gave evidence that, because Bill Neill denied any intentional misconduct or deliberate touching on his part, application of the two-witness rule meant that BCB’s allegations could not be proven according to the Scriptures, so the matter could not progress to judicial committee stage. This was the case even though Mr Horley had no reason to disbelieve BCB’s allegations.p. 52
The letter of 1 February 1992 also reported that both Mr Horley and Mr Doug Jackson were ‘impressed by Brother Neill’s acceptance of counsel and his humility throughout the ordeal’ and recommended that he be appointed as an elder again ‘once this has died down’. from p. 54
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TD
Jehovah's Witnesses are definitely organized along patriarchal lines, so anything that preserves the status quo protects that arrangement by extension if nothing else. The same can be said of most fundamentalist Christian denominations, as the book from which they draw their authority (i.e. The Bible) is the product of a much more primitive time.
The term, "Patriarchy" (Especially when it is preceded by a definite article) has gradually acquired a more esoteric meaning than this though. It is often used in a similar sense to the terms, "The Establishment" and "The Man" which implies an active conspiracy to keep a disadvantaged group at a disadvantage forever.
I'm not sure how applicable that is to JW's. Certainly they hold some very outdated and unfair attitudes towards women, but it seems to be more a by-product of fundamentalism than their raison d'etre.
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Ruby456
nice to hear from you TD
patriarchal is probably used differently here in the uk and Australia than in the US. i think the ARC uses the term to signify male centric and that is how we use it here too.
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Lostandfound
Yes, as posted by others, UK Charity Commission pretty toothless unless patent fraud uncovered (financial), what WT fears is any publicity on ANYTHING, light shining into dark corners terrifies them. Publicity may be the disinfectant needed to remove WTs hold over people. ARC far and away more powerful than CC. Here the Indepedent Review of abuse cases is bogged down in a mire of distrust, incompetence and failed leadership. That should have been as effective a disinfectant as was the ARC. WT must love the incompetence.
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Vidiot
Simon - "...the prevalence of child abuse blows a huge hole below the waterline of their claims that they are God's representatives and that people are selected by his inerrant holy spirit..."
This.
After all, it's not as though being a rank-and-file Jehovah's Witness is an overly pleasant way of life.
The concept that the WTS is "God's Earthly Organization" is the primary carrot that keeps the majority of them from leaving (even the disgruntled ones). Remove that, and there's virtually zero incentive left to stay (particularly when you factor in all the other faults, flaws, and foibles the Org has displayed over the years).
A lot of us tend to forget this, but without the global membership supporting it, the survival chances of the Org itself drop significantly (and what's more, the WT knows it, hence the current steady transition into real estate).
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Vidiot
Not to mention the fact that by the Org's own stated standards, if they are not "God's Earthly Organization", they have no legitimate justification to even exist.
And from their perspective, that simply cannot be allowed to happen.
Remember folks, for the higher-ups in the hierarchy (especially the GB), the WT's survival means their survival...
...because without the Org, these men would have nothing.
They would be nothing.