You have to ask yourself though, what pushes people to do this to their family? Or their friends? This is not normal behavior. If it is totally wrong according to the JWs why don' t they stop it. Why do they do it?
Instead of the word forced what about coerced?
Merriam-Webster
coerced; coercing1: to compel to an act or choicewas coerced into agreeingabusers who coerce their victims into silence2: to achieve by force or threatcoerce compliancecoerce obedience3: to restrain or dominate by forcereligion in the past has tried to coerce the irreligious—W. R. Inge
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/coerce
Cambridge Dictionary
coerceverb [ T ]formal
UK /kəʊˈɜːs/ US /koʊˈɝːs/Add to word list to persuade someone forcefully to do something that they are unwilling to do:
The court heard that the six defendants had been coerced into making a confession.
https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/coerce
When you threaten a person that there is a penalty for not following the rules, you are coercing obedience. For Witnesses there are penalties
- Possibility that you will be disfellowshipped for just talking to a disfellowshipped person. Then you will be shunned. If you haven't read Ray Franz then perhaps now is a good time.
- Death at Armageddon
- Losing out on a paradise earth.
Coercion is a legal term and it most definitely illegal. Few parents want to shun their child or never talk to a parent or miss out on a family member's marriage or the birth of a child that you will never see. It is beyond cruel to force them to do it. And they do it because they have been coerced into thinking they do not have a choice.
The victims of shunning are alone. Many times they have no friends on the outside. They are unfamiliar with the legal and social systems that could help them. After years of warnings they are afraid of therapy. And they have been repeatedly told over YEARS that those who leave, whether willingly or not, are doomed not only to die at Armageddon but doomed to a terrible life outside the Witnesses.
On top of that they grew up in a world of immediate friendship. They know very little about how to and who to trust. And depressed, searching for some kindness many fall into bad situations.
With the internet many have learned to develop happy satisfying lives. But it is so much harder than it needs to be if their development had included how to live in the real world instead of a closed group - a cult.
Making mandatory shunning a crime might not make sense to some of you. But we have to start somewhere. Courts are listening.
The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR)
Its judgments are binding on the countries concerned and have led governments to alter their legislation and administrative practice in a wide range of areas. The Court’s case-law makes the Convention a modern and powerful living instrument for meeting new challenges and consolidating the rule of law and democracy in Europe.The European Convention on Human Rights is an international treaty under which the member States of the Council of Europe promise to secure fundamental civil and political rights, not only to their own citizens but also to everyone within their jurisdiction.
The European Court of Human Rights is an international court set up in 1959. It rules on individual or State applications alleging violations of the civil and political rights set out in the European Convention on Human Rights. Since 1998 it has sat as a full-time court and individuals can apply to it directly. The Court examined hundreds of thousands of applications since it was set up.
The Convention secures:
• the right to life
• the right to a fair hearing
• the right to respect for private and family life
• freedom of expression
• freedom of thought conscience and religionOur goal
Current relevant cases
As mandated shunning cases make their way from member state courts to the ECHR we will post updates.
Our ultimate goal is to set the legal precedent for mandated shunning as a hate crime, by funding international legal cases that highlight the issue and get it enshrined and enforced in law. We already have a major case in the Belgium Supreme Court. If successful, this will set the necessary precedent for prosecutions of high-control groups for mandated shunning. [Bold mine]