For those interested in why "Skittles" created this post, I will be happy to provide the facts.
First, John Cedars did not block anyone, and was not involved with the exchanges and posts made by Skittles. I blocked him for repeated aggravations and violations of JW Survey's terms of service. We responded to dozens of emails from Skittles as well as multiple online posts, but he was not satisfied with the answers provided, so he continued to aggressively attack the editors and the survey itself, and his repeated rants were simply going nowhere.
This activity began when editor Covert Fade covered a Salt Lake Utah article which involved the rape of a JW minor by someone that Skittles claims to know. He questioned a statement made by the Salt Lake journalist, after which Covert Fade defended his coverage of the article. Once we were contacted by family members who actually had all of the facts, we updated our article to reflect the correct information.
Unfortunately Skittles would not leave the matter alone, and felt that it was necessary to continue arguing with Covert Fade and myself. He further claimed at one point that the girl who was raped was in fact having consensual sex with the perpetrator. I will not repeat what he said, but suffice it to say that he grew more enraged by the minute, particularly as he felt cornered by the JW Survey editorial staff and the step-father of the victim.
More recently the situation escalated when Skittles began commenting with heated criticism of my recent JW Survey article, the subject of which was the 2015 Survey results. He quickly lost control and did not agree with our replies or our defense of the Survey, and his comments became extremely volatile and ad-hominem, at which point he was in violation of our site rules, and I blocked him.
I have no problem at all with anyone disagreeing with an article or the Survey. One person commented about the bias of the Survey, and my reply was essentially that of course the Survey is biased, in the sense that we already know that we will not get results from the most hard-core Witnesses in the organization. However we do get survey results from active Witnesses, as we have for many years. If someone does not want to believe or accept the results, or even my analysis of those results, they are free to disagree, and they will not be blocked.
Since I have been involved we have only had to block a very small handful of persons who became extremely aggressive, and lost control of their ability to be objective and carry on a civilized discussion. This is what happened with Skittles, and he was blocked. Once this happened he became even more enraged and proceeded to post here as well as Reddit - at which point Cedars/Lloyd became aware of the situation and engaged him directly. It became clear that his hate was directed at Cedars, despite Lloyd having nothing to do with this.
At the end of the day, he was allowed to comment many times on both articles, but he simply was not satisfied with the responses and lost control. On the Reddit post, he went so far as to suggest that if he could, he would chase Lloyd down at his book signing if he did not live so far away. Then a second person who lives closer to the location chimed in that he wanted to go himself. All of this was clearly threatening, and it is not the first time Lloyd received such threats.
I have seen a number of comments on this post which are false, incendiary, and suggest that Lloyd desires to be some sort of cult leader. This of course is the furthest thing from the truth, and frankly most of the comments I have heard of this nature are from very angry persons who are simply stirring the pot instead of helping people escape from the Watchtower organization. If you don't like something Lloyd said to you or the manner in which he said it - then that's your business; we are not all going to agree on everything, from politics to religion. The one thing most of us have in common is that we managed to escape the Watchtower organization -so let's focus on that instead of attacking one another.
In summation - we found out very quickly what type of person we were dealing with and had to block that person, and I am sure most editors would have done the same thing. Turns out - we were right, as you can see from the comment from this individual accusing Lloyd of being an "ego-maniac" with a "Trump complex" - and someone who wishes to single handedly bring down the organization. Anyone who knows him is aware this is not the case. We must all work together to end undue influence in its many forms, so my advice to those who wish to perpetuate their anger is to remember who the real enemy is, and find a way to help people instead of wasting time arguing on web sites or Facebook or elsewhere. Life is too short for that. So find a way to contribute - create a website, write letters to politicians and charity commissions, contribute to organizations who are making a difference.
Either way we need to decide what to do and make our time productive. So if you are done with the JW organization and you don't want to help an activist, then find a different cause or charity or hobby - you will be a happier person for it.
For anyone desiring clarification of my comments, I can be reached on the contact email address posted on the JW Survey site. I wish you all happy holidays and a happy new year.
John Redwood
