"If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land." 2 Chronicles 7:14 ____ "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life." John 3:16
Inside the Jehovah’s Witnesses’ Secret Pedophile Database
Inside the Jehovah’s Witnesses’ Secret Pedophile Database
UNHOLY
Vice
The
Vice TV doc “Crusaders” examines a secret database of thousands of
Jehovah’s Witness child-sex offenders that’s been assembled by the Watch
Tower Bible and Tract Society.
Aaron Kaufman’s film Crusaders—released as part of Vice TV’s “Vice Versa” nonfiction series—eviscerates the Jehovah’s Witness faith
in which he was raised, giving a public platform for former members to
speak out about the scourge of pedophilia within the church, and about
the elders who are committed to keeping it a secret.
Premiering on Vice TV on July 28, Crusaders builds upon Douglas Quenqua’s 2019 Atlantic article
about a secret database of thousands of Jehovah’s Witness child-sex
offenders that’s been assembled, and concealed from prying eyes, by the
Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society, the nonprofit organization that
governs the church. This damning list of molesters was created on March
14, 1997, when—in response to prior whistleblower complaints—a
questionnaire was sent to all 10,000 nationwide congregations asking
members if they suspected any fellow Witnesses of being a pedophilic
predator. The church received information on many monsters in its midst,
although the precise number of names remains unknown.
Most of those individuals’ identities are also a mystery—but not all of them. That’s because, as Crusaders
reveals, two ex-Jehovah’s Witnesses (who in Kaufman’s film go by
“Judas” and “Jezebel”) broke into a local Massachusetts headquarters and
stole some of those incriminating files. Moreover, they leaked one
document on Reddit, and then sent many more to a kindred ex-Jehovah’s
Witness activist named Mark O’Donnell (who operated online under the
alias “John Redwood”). This, in turn, led to Quenqua’s article, which
made national headlines and shined an accusatory national spotlight on
Jehovah’s Witnesses, who didn’t take too kindly to being outed as an
organization that, in principle, condemned child abusers, but in
practice made sure to keep their crimes under wraps, lest the faith get a
black eye as a haven for the worst of the worst.
Crusaders
works hard to slam Jehovah’s Witnesses, which also entails examining
the belief systems and control mechanisms used by the religion to
manipulate and dominate its adherents. The core notion embraced by
Jehovah’s Witnesses is that Armageddon is imminent, and that the only
way to be saved from a terrible end-times death is to abide by their
tenets, which are dispensed by the Watch Tower Governing Body—a ruling
council of male elders who function as God’s Earthly conduits. By toeing
the line that they set forth, Witnesses will be granted access to the
New System, a post-apocalypse paradise where they can begin their real
lives, as opposed to their current New System-prologue existences in the
here and now. Follow the rules and you’re golden; disobey—or even
question—them, and you risk excommunication from friends, family, and
the only community you’ve ever known.
At
regular intervals, Kaufman’s documentary provides white on-screen text
cards defining key Jehovah’s Witnesses terms, such as “disfellowshipped”
(i.e. expulsion for insubordination), “PIMO” (short for “physically in,
mentally out”), and the “Two Witness Rule,” a scriptural decree which
states that no Jehovah’s Witness can be officially accused of committing
a sin without two corroborating eyewitness accounts. That last
stipulation is of particular importance, since it basically negates
charges of sexual assault, which very rarely take place in the presence
of others. Crusaders lays bare this monstrous practice through
official Jehovah’s Witness videos of elders preaching this doctrine as
sacred—their cocky authoritarian firmness on this issue reeking of
transparent self-preservation, if not outright deviance—as well as via
testimonials with a number of ex-Jehovah’s Witnesses who were molested
by their true-believer comrades.
In the stories of Mark and Kimmy
O’Donnell (the latter of whom was terrorized for years by her mother,
who suffered no repercussions for her reported offenses and still has
contact with children), Kameron Torres, Asher, Judas and other
ex-Jehovah’s Witnesses, Crusaders provides wrenching first-hand
accounts of sex-abuse ordeals. In almost every one of these cases,
pressure to conform and stay silent was demanded not only by church
officials but also by parents, grandparents, friends and colleagues, all
of whom were so convinced of their righteous path that they believed
the act of cutting off their loved ones was actually a merciful gesture
designed to guarantee their eventual salvation. Such was the case with
Barbara Anderson, a Jehovah’s Witness for 43 years until she broke with
the organization after learning about its habit of sheltering
pedophiles—a decision that cost her a relationship with her son.
That
last stipulation is of particular importance, since it basically
negates charges of sexual assault, which very rarely take place in the
presence of others.
Director
Kaufman confidently complements his heartbreaking interviews with news
headlines, Jehovah’s Witness literature and documents, and illuminating
videos of elders preaching to the camera and being surreptitiously
recorded by Kameron (during which one bigwig states about the
molestation suffered by Kameron and his own sons, “You just learn
to live with it and put it behind you. Try not to bring it up, try not
to dwell on it”). While some of his dramatic recreations can be clunky
and stilted—be it staged sequences of Judas and Jezebel breaking into
their local HQ to steal database documents, or filler shots of Mark
O’Donnell typing away at his computer—his overall approach is
straightforward and clear-sighted, explicating the canny methods
employed by Jehovah’s Witnesses to exert and maintain authority over
their followers.
The principal portrait that coalesces is one of a highly structured and
immensely dangerous cult. There’s little difference between the Jehovah’s Witnesses and Scientology—or, for that matter, Heaven’s Gate.
A scare-tactic outfit that preached that the end of the world was nigh,
and that they alone possessed the knowledge needed to escape death and
damnation, Heaven’s Gate also required members to distance themselves
from non-believers, do precisely what leaders said, and go to any length
to prove their loyalty. In the case of the Jehovah’s Witnesses, the
price paid by many for buying into this extreme religious dogma has been
years of sexual abuse, and feelings of shame and powerlessness born
from not being able to do anything about it. In that regard, Crusaders isn’t just an exposé, it’s a rousing call to arms.
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