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In Reply to: Re: Your thoughts posted by Coordinator on September 20, 2007 at 05:58:07:
I can understand your concerns better now. But do I understand this correctly:
you feel a) they "should publically distance themselves from The Family" and b) they should "tell us what they now think " "to make a public statement for the record".
I think that makes sense. I am only wondering, to avoid creating more pages of links that compound the problem, if the point is to clear it up for people who knew of them through the Family pubs etc., wouldn't a statement of their heartfelt regrets and current renunciations of Family teachings and practices do this? I would think that even initials of Bible names and identification through there office, field etc., would let anyone who knew them and was affected by there actions in the Family that visit this site who it is that is renouncing and apologizing? (w/o creating more damaging weblinks).
If this is the concern, would such a step clear the way to removing "searchable references" to them from the site? Such a step seems to meet your criteria, is completely transparent to siter users (while hopefully removing some of the obstacles towards this family moving on for the benefit of the second and third generations being negatively impacted by the current situation.)
As far as the 3 categories of "other parties" , let me ask:
1) "general public they have decieved". If they have been decieved then they will not in anyway benefit from any action you or the family involved take. It seems outside of the issue of this discussion to me.
2)"exmembers they have offended". Wouldn't the solution proposed deal with that just as effectively as the current policy? (I would think moreso.)
3)"other members/exmembers they have encouraged to support the Family". Again, same situation as point 2, it seems to me.
If the point is to try and at least express their regrets, and hopefully be another voice of the "converted" to expose the harmful teachings and practices of the cult, that seems to accomplish a lot more than people simply avoiding as much as possible any further risk to their family through additional internet roadblocks to a new life. (New and fruitful lives of well known exmembers seems to be a positive thing, in that it may encourage others to get the heck out!)
If the point is to inflict more "punitive damages" on those who leave, well, I guess the current situation works. To my thinking, I would think the collateral damage to innocent second generation would be enough to outweigh any such consideration. But it seems the perhaps some solution along the lines discussed better meets the purposes you outline.
Your thoughts?
