Chaserious

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Posts by Chaserious

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  60

  Is The WTS Building Beth Sarim 2 ?

  by metatron in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  i continue to puzzle over the future direction the watchtower is taking.

  it seems very strange.. let's review: they are selling everything off in brooklyn, raking in huge sums from that real estate and building heavily in a fairly isolated part of upstate ny.. why?.

  it may be classified as a country club (legally).

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  Chaserious

  Transferring assets to avoid creditors or potential creditors is against the law

  The first part is correct, but the second is not. It's perfectly legal to transfer assets if that transfer happens to have the effect of making the assets unavailable to unknown future creditors. Under fraudulent transfer law there has to be an intent to avoid a specific liability. By making transfers when the organization is in good financial condition, they stay out of constructive fraudulent transfer territory also. And even if transfers are determined to be fraudulent, there is a limited look back period, so after enough time passes even a fraudulent transfer can't be reached. Under bankruptcy law, preferential transfers can be recovered from a bankrupt even without meeting the above, but at most you can only go back one year. I'm not an expert on trusts, but I'm sure if they wanted to, they could move assets into some kind of asset-protection trusts outside of the U.S., or transfer assets to another Watchtower related corporation overseas and after a while, those assets couldn't be reached to satisfy U.S. judgments. (Or make it so expensive to reach that judgment creditors will settle for pennies on the dollar). As an example, it's not uncommon at all for doctors to make some of their assets hard to reach just in case there is a huge malpractice suit. You just can't do it after you commit the malpractice.

  That said, I highly doubt asset protection is a significant factor. If the WTS were to face massive liability, the new branch land and buildings would still be available, as would all of the assembly halls and at least all domestic assets. I'm sure they aren't planning on that happening.
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  60

  Is The WTS Building Beth Sarim 2 ?

  by metatron in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  i continue to puzzle over the future direction the watchtower is taking.

  it seems very strange.. let's review: they are selling everything off in brooklyn, raking in huge sums from that real estate and building heavily in a fairly isolated part of upstate ny.. why?.

  it may be classified as a country club (legally).

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  Chaserious

  There is a clear paper trial between the two, meaning that claims against the WTBS can follow them to the new place.

  While I don't think the purpose of the move is to liquidate (at least in the sense of concealing assets), only past claims will follow them to the new place via a "paper trail." In theory, the proceeds from the Brooklyn sales could be transferred to other entities or otherwise disposed of such that they are not available to pay future claims that may arise. I do think liquidating the real estate to free it to invest might be part of the motivation, as Las Malvinas suggested. If you can sell Brooklyn for $1B and build the new compound for $200M (give or take), you might as well free up the other ~$800M to invest and earn income on. Being near cargo ports doesn't matter any longer.
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  32

  Is (a possible) revised NWT prompted by lapsing copyright?

  by slimboyfat in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  in the united states i gather that copyright lasts for the lifetime of the author plus 70 years.

  if copyright only lasts for 70 years from publication of anonymous works, then copyright for the nwt of the christian greek scriptures would be due to run out in a few years.

  watchtower leaders probably don't like the idea of others being able to publish hard copies or circulate the nwt in ebook format.

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  Chaserious

  I don't know a ton about copyright, but the life of the author + 70 years rule only applies to works first published after 1978, so it would not apply to the NWT. Also, re-printing a work with a new copyright date does not restart the copyright period. First publication is the key date, and last printing doesn't matter, contrary to what was indicated above.

  This said, and subject to correction if someone else is more expert on copyright law, I believe that because the original copyright was renewed, the NWT's U.S. copyright period would last 95 years, so until at least 2045. (I believe the "Greek Scriptures" was published in 1950. I'm not sure whether the copyright for the entire publication would expire then, given that the "Hebrew Scriptures" was not published until later). The anonymous/known author distinction that ties the expiration to the death of the author only applies to works first published in 1978 or later. Here is a good summary of copyright term length for various works: http://copyright.cornell.edu/resources/publicdomain.cfm
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  33

  Evolution, Biogeography VS. Experimental archaeology

  by Brother of the Hawk in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  i thought of posting this on an ongoing thread regarding proof of noahs flood by poster *lost*, but i think a separate thread is needed.

  this is why.. first my disclaimer.

  this thread is a theory since so many people love the theory and so as not to hurt feelings and insult anyone, this is only a theory.. my personal observation is this, as long as you bash watchtower all is ok. as soon as you try to present any resemblance of christianity or any belief in the bible, such as the flood, you are personally bashed.

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  Chaserious

  I don't usually open the threads on the accuracy of evolution since I don't often find them interesting, but when I read the OP's post, it made me think that it just shows that neither creationists or realists have the market cornered on being assholes. Then I went to the thread by *lost* on Noah's flood here. BOTH wrote, in quotations, that *lost* was told in the other thread " You can do all the research you want, just don’t post it here." The only problem is that it does not seem that quotation appears anywhere in the other thread. So it seems all that is left is the OP making up his own mis-quotation from the other thread, angrily responding to his made up/paraphrased quotation, and then taunting another member for having potentially terminal cancer based on a complete lack of understanding of what "survival of the fittest" means from a scientific standpoint. That KO punch is looking a bit like a boomerang punch now, isn't it?
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  85

  The final chapter in the confusedandalone story...

  by confusedandalone in

  1. jw
  2. experiences

  this morning i get a frantic call from my sister (who has been baptized 1 year and one month and never attends meetings anymore).

  in tears she tells me that this morning my father picked her up in the car and told her that i was am apostate.

  that i no longer loved jehovah and that i was going to be disfellowshipped.

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  Chaserious

  Congrats on making your freedom official! Thanks for sharing your interesting stories, and I'm sorry to hear about how some of your family members have treated you.
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  27

  Is the Watchtower a Communist front?

  by bytheirworks in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  in the chinese language you have 2 versions: traditional & simplified.. ever since the watchtower opened a field office in hong kong, they have made the watchtower study magazines into two versions: traditional & simplified.. the watchtower's communist roots go back further than that.

  charles taze russel in his early watch tower (notice there is a difference between watch tower aka guard tower.... & watchtower aka enochian magic, aka justice league, aka league of the just men 1834, aka communist league 1847) predicted some 36 years in advance that there would be a communist revolution in russia.

  it was called many things but in 1918 it was officially called a communist revolution, exactly around the time when the government began arresting rutherford.. when you do the research you find that the last communist meeting was held in allegheny pennsylvania, exactly where & when russel began his watch tower.. don't you find it strange that the watchtower is able to produce so many worker bee jw's, who operate like mindless robots???.

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  Chaserious

  Cool story
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  19

  Religioulous

  by snare&racket in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  not sure how many here have watched this... but make a coffee and make the time to do so.... its edutainment ;) .

  .

  http://youtu.be/e2zhldbmfdg.

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  Chaserious

  I thought it was amusing, and some of the targets deserved the mockery, like the gay therapy guy (my personal favorite), the theme park people, and "Dr." Cummings. I found treatment of some of the other subjects to be mean-spirited, like the truckers at the roadside chapel and the Jewish man who converted to Christianity. I get that his point is that none of it is harmless, but even as a skeptic I can't really get on board with making fun of people's sincere beliefs when they aren't pushing it on others.
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  26

  Peace and Security - When?

  by rhodesboy in

  1. watchtower
  2. bible

  my interpretation of gb (governing body) theology has illuminated a fate for mankind in the near future.

  i invite you to read the following extracts and my analysis thereafter- theologists only please.. 1 thessalonians 5:3.

  ''whenever it is that they are saying: "peace and security!

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  Chaserious

  This is all assuming that "the time of the end" is referring to the 21st century, which doesn't seem to be based on any plausible evidence. It also calls for the assumption that the King of the North in Daniel is any more real than the King of the North in Game of Thrones.
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  16

  A little Update... Going back to school.

  by dazed but not confused in

  1. social
  2. current

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  im going back to school tomorrow.

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  Chaserious

  Great news, Dazed. Best of luck with school!
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  14

  Article: Ten Legal Risks Facing Churches and Church Leaders, by Richard Hammar

  by AndersonsInfo in

  1. watchtower
  2. child-abuse

  http://enrichmentjournal.ag.org/200401/200401_78_legalrisks.cfm.

  ten legal risks facing churches and church leaders.

  by richard r. hammar.

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  Chaserious

  I understand why some people think that because the doctrines are nonsensical, WT legal policies must be foolish also, but I'm not sure that's the case. As with any big organization, the goal is not eliminating legal liability; that's not going to happen. The goal is to reduce exposures to a comfortably small percentage of revenue and to be able to budget for it. The large reliance on volunteers mostly, if not totally, eliminates employment law exposure. The proportion of JWs who the society is liable for on an agency basis is also smaller than most other religions. For example, if a Catholic Priest caused a car accident while driving around making visits to shut-in parishoners, the diocese would be liable since the Priest is an agent. For the society to be liable, it would have to rise to the level of a circuit overseer or bethelite doing the same thing - they would never be liable without their own negligence for elders or MS running around doing JW business. They also don't have formal counseling or children's programs, and no official elder or MS business involves any one-on-one time with children, so I am not sure that they would be liable merely for not conducting background checks. The only activity where one might be alone with a child would be field service, but that's not activity specific to being appointed - all JWs go in field service.

  On top of all this, add the culture of JWs not feeling free to bring lawsuits against JW entities if they want to remain as a member. There is no way to know for sure, but I would be very surprised if Watchtower's average annual payout for legal settlements, judgments and liability insurance, as a percentage of total revenue, was not one of the lowest of all centrally organized religions in the U.S.