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Wolves in Sheep's Clothing and a Solution...

A

Anonymous

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Recently I've had issues with another unnamed polygamist over a matter I won't discuss at this point. However, that experience brought to light a problem and the inklings of a solution, and I'd like to discuss it with the group.

We've been seeing "wolves in sheep's clothing" in many polygamy-related groups. We've also seen many decent and trustworthy persons. How can we tell the two apart?

These have been men or women who often leave a trail of disaster behind and blacken the term polygamy, when it is the person that is at fault. There should be a way to distinguish this kind of thing with some kind of "Blacklist/Whitelist" for:


(1) The purpose of discovering the type of people we are dealing with--i.e., what are their actions, what are people's opinions of them, what are their religious viewpoints and lifestyles, etc.

(2) Identifying those that are the center of trouble on a regular basis.

(3) Increasing the safety of single men and women and families in the polygamy arena.

(4) Identifying good people and good families, who are seen in the community as decent people.

(5) Rooting out the persons that give polygamy a bad name, to encourage the view that polygamy is a righteous form of marriage.


Such a system could be based upon a star-rating, with short moderated commentaries, available only to a membership which has agreed to the rules and conditions of accessing said system. It could contain detailed information or sparse information about a person, as members see fit, to identify by name or alias. (Only publicly available information would be provided to membership. I.E., name, family members, location, but not private information like letters or e-mails which could open up people to libel.)

It seems to me that such a system would be of immense value to help sort out many of the problems we encounter in polygamy from time to time, while benefiting us all.

What do you think about the idea?

Any improvements or additional suggestions which would make the idea better?

Looking forward to hearing what you all have to say! :D


John for Christ
 
Just today, I was discussing this very problem with two BF members.

My idea is that we need to have a "code of conduct" outlining what is and is not acceptable behavior for someone who wishes to be part of Biblical Families. And that code should be more stringent for those in leadership than for others, because the leaders should set the example.

I'm not sure a rating system would be workable. How does someone get rated? How do we know if someone doing the rating might have some grudge against someone else and cause a person's rating to go down unjustly?

Maybe it can be worked out somehow, though.
Matthew 18:15-17 NKJV "Moreover if your brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault between you and him alone. If he hears you, you have gained your brother. (16) But if he will not hear, take with you one or two more, that 'BY THE MOUTH OF TWO OR THREE WITNESSES EVERY WORD MAY BE ESTABLISHED.' (17) And if he refuses to hear them, tell it to the church. But if he refuses even to hear the church, let him be to you like a heathen and a tax collector.["]
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If we don't police ourselves, Big Brother will be more than happy to interfere and do it for us, usually for a big "license fee."
 
PolyDoc said:
Just today, I was discussing this very problem with two BF members.

My idea is that we need to have a "code of conduct" outlining what is and is not acceptable behavior for someone who wishes to be part of Biblical Families. And that code should be more stringent for those in leadership than for others, because the leaders should set the example.

I'm not sure a rating system would be workable. How does someone get rated? How do we know if someone doing the rating might have some grudge against someone else and cause a person's rating to go down unjustly?

Maybe it can be worked out somehow, though.
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Well, in my scenario, there are "trusted" people that have already been established, which "vouch" for new members. That might not be practical for everyone, but as friendships and trust develops, that person can be rated by people that know him by the length of their association.

I envisioned two levels of rating: Trusted member ratings and public ratings.

The tallied star ratings could either be based upon a system where trusted members get stronger say, OR it could be based upon two star ratings, one for those trusted members that know them, another for those in the public that know them but haven't had extensive interaction with them.

Someone could leave a terrible rating, but with the tracking of e-mail addresses and IP address and other identifying information, as well as a moderating system to maintain checks and balances, I think it could be a workable solution. The more ratings obtained, the less an angry person could sway the ratings. We could have a minimum of 5 or 10 ratings to establish a rating for an individual.

Then there could be a limited amount of input WHY the person is trusted or untrusted, based upon a generic dropdown list for each rater. For instance, "Has been a good and faithful friend" or "Have had physical confrontations" or the like. The generic dropdown comments would be designed to prevent details that could lead to slander.

Or perhaps a generic checklist would work better: [x} Difficult, [x] A man/woman of God, [ ] Smelly (just kidding), etc. These could be tallied and measured in various categories like personality, Argumentation/Confrontation, or whatever.

Clearly I'm still working out the details. I'm open to all suggestions. Some will work better than others, I'm sure.


John for Christ
 
john
as marvin pointed out, Yeshua has given us THE biblical method for blacklisting which starts with going to the person that you feel has sinned against you.
have you done this?
or are you proposing that it is best to just start with step 4 and skip 1-3?

maybe the facts are not quite what you assume them to be.
 
steve said:
john
as marvin pointed out, Yeshua has given us THE biblical method for blacklisting which starts with going to the person that you feel has sinned against you.
have you done this?
or are you proposing that it is best to just start with step 4 and skip 1-3?

maybe the facts are not quite what you assume them to be.
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Hi Steve,

I think you misunderstand my purpose. Beyond that, many, if not most of the people interested in polygamy are NOT open to the Biblical method of handling disputes, nor are they particularly "brethren".

You are perfectly right that if we have a personal disagreement that we ought to go to that person with whom we have the disagreement, then take a witness if step one doesn't work, and so forth. That's not the issue at all.

The issue is identifying people both good and bad, or rather people with desirable characteristics and those with undesirable characteristics, for the benefit of the movement as a whole.

While this may stem out of a personal issue I have experienced recently, my purpose isn't to blacklist anyone. Notice I said blacklist and whitelist, and I'm interested in this as a community tool, not as a personal vendetta, which I am not the type of person to pursue. (Lest you think you know what I'm talking about, there was more than one event in question that prompted this thought process.)

Along the lines of what you are saying, though, this could also be a tool to encourage people to reconcile with the aid of some of the more trusted leadership (to be determined, of course). The threat of "bad press" if a person were to proceed to break up families, or abuse others, or rant and rave, or whatever the case may be, would be of value to discourage bad behavior, and would encourage them to seek the free reconciliation/counseling service to maintain a good status. (That is, if we can manage to provide short reconciliation sessions at no cost. There would need to be guidelines for reconciliation as well.)

Again, these are thoughts and ideas, and I appreciate your input. It is valuable (and righteous) and I agree with it, though I'm not certain that you fully understood the purpose at least initially. Remember that Matthew 18:15-17 refers to our "brethren", not our neighbors, those being two distinctive groups.

The polygamy movement EVEN ON THIS FORUM consists of believers and unbelievers. There are Christians, Mormons, Muslims, atheists, agnostics, pagans, and others which inhabit these groups. Some tell the truth about their identity, some do not. Some lie through their teeth. Others are scrupulously honest. At the very least, we can use such a tool to sort out people's religious viewpoints, which can be very important.

Thank you for your input!


John for Christ
 
john_for_christ wrote:
The polygamy movement EVEN ON THIS FORUM consists of believers and unbelievers. There are Christians, Mormons, Muslims, atheists, agnostics, pagans, and others which inhabit these groups. Some tell the truth about their identity, some do not. Some lie through their teeth. Others are scrupulously honest. At the very least, we can use such a tool to sort out people's religious viewpoints, which can be very important.
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There may be non-Christians on this forum, but please take a look at the forum's name: Biblical Families, not Quran Families or Book of Mormon Families or Atheist Families. Non-Christians should be welcome as long as they don't try to hijack the forum, and as long as they can agree to abide by our Bible-based values and standards so as not to discredit us in some way.

The thing that distinguishes our group from other Christian groups is not some different doctrine about Who God is, or Who Jesus is, or how to be saved, or any other fundamental Christian doctrine, but what we believe that the Bible teaches about families. We believe in Biblical Family Values, not Traditional Family Values. (Sorry, Dr. Dobson and others who preach and teach Traditional Family Values - you are wrong about that.)

And yes, John, I agree that we need to find a way to distinguish the wolves from the sheep. Then we need to evangelize the wolves and hope that they eventually become sheep! (Only God can change them, of course.)
 
John,
The greatest thing I like about Biblical Families is the connection without governance. The ability to provide fellowship, teaching, and resources while at the same time allowing each person/family to operate and function independently.

I think I understand what you are talking about though. A system that would allow us to stay informed about people so that we could make educated decisions and avoid pitfalls. I think one of the biggest disadvantages would be the problem with people getting their feelings hurt for not getting the ratings that they want or star level that they think they should have and then leaving or putting up walls to others. I was actually on a message board like that one time where every person could give a thumbs up or thumbs down on each post. Each post calculated up would then be the score for the user themselves. It just turned the entire board into cliques and caused division and separation.

I agree with Dr George and Steve. If there is an issue let us take care of it ourselves on a case by case basis. The hard part for most people is getting up the guts to go to someone over an issue.
 
The Duke Of Marshall said:
John,
The greatest thing I like about Biblical Families is the connection without governance. The ability to provide fellowship, teaching, and resources while at the same time allowing each person/family to operate and function independently.

I think I understand what you are talking about though. A system that would allow us to stay informed about people so that we could make educated decisions and avoid pitfalls. I think one of the biggest disadvantages would be the problem with people getting their feelings hurt for not getting the ratings that they want or star level that they think they should have and then leaving or putting up walls to others. I was actually on a message board like that one time where every person could give a thumbs up or thumbs down on each post. Each post calculated up would then be the score for the user themselves. It just turned the entire board into cliques and caused division and separation.

I agree with Dr George and Steve. If there is an issue let us take care of it ourselves on a case by case basis. The hard part for most people is getting up the guts to go to someone over an issue.
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Hi Todd,

One of the best features of such a system would be to have a short "bio" of each individual, with various information. For instance, a person's religion could be noted, so that those interested in polygamy could avoid those of another religion if they wanted. Christians could be distinguished from Mormons, Muslims, various Messianic groups, etc. That way Christians could avoid becoming unevenly-yoked with unbelievers.

Regardless, this idea is going to happen, whether it is a feature of Biblical Families or a stand-alone website. It's inevitable that a solution will be found to separate the dangerous people on the Internet from the safe.

I wasn't really asking whether people liked the system or not. I wanted ideas for the system itself. But thank you for your input. It helps me consider how to overcome the issues you have noted.


John for Christ
 
I see some basic problems for this type of system and I doubt they can be overcome, nor do I want them to be overcome. (IMHO) :) : 1. The man power and resources would demand quite an investment of time and money for all involved. 2. Perhaps it is my old self, rebellious nature, but I don't want to trust someone else with this kind of power. Who would it be? 3. Polygyny by nature is patriarchal and patriarchy by nature is designed to have the husband/father in charge of this type of responsibility for his family. To attempt to develop a program to protect people in polyworld is to bypass the patriarchs and make someone else responsible. I will seek God for discernment between the wolves and sheep.
Perhaps the best way to disrobe the wolves is to do away with the anonymity of screen names and hidden identities?

signed: John L. Whitten of Apache Junction, AZ.
 
Oops.

Apparently I failed to make my position clear... :oops:

The Duke said:
I agree with Dr George and Steve. If there is an issue let us take care of it ourselves on a case by case basis.
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So let me try again.

Individual problems between members should be handled by those members if at all possible. If we are all mature Christians, that should resolve 99% of the problems that arise.

But there are those who, like john_for_christ mentioned, lie through their teeth about their beliefs, their motives, their agenda, their reasons for becoming part of this Forum, and even their reasons for attending Retreats and Conferences. Those individuals are truly wolves in sheep's clothing, teaching false doctrines and generally causing problems, and need to be dealt with by the leadership of Biblical Families in a Scripturally-prescribed manner. I'm not talking about those who might disagree with some of our stated doctrinal positions and are open about their disagreement, and discuss their doctrinal differences with us. I'm talking about the liars and hypocrites who claim one thing and believe/live out another.

Think of the staff members as Elders. It is their responsibility to protect the flock from those wolves, and as much as is possible, to protect the Biblical Families/Polygyny movement from the damage they might cause to our reputation. Those wolves need to be handled by our leaders, not by the rest of the sheep, in accordance with Matthew 18:15-17.

But how can the wolves be identified? JFC mentioned one possible way. The Duke said (from experience, not just theory) that doing it that way might cause more problems than it solves.

So let's keep discussing this, and maybe we can suggest something to our Elders (the staff of BF) that will be workable.

BTW, I know that BF is not a church, but we are an organization that is, in some ways, church-like. The Scriptural principles for governing a church (local assembly of believers) should apply to BF as well.
 
john,
you are correct, i was assuming that you were speaking of a problem specifically with people on the bibfam site. but you are speaking of the poly-world in total.
whew. that is a big order, and yes, most will not respond to a matt. 18 arrangement.
thinking....
thinking....
thinking....
ok, our whole world (even in the mundane, nonspiritual) if full of "buyer beware". we have warnings on responding to calls from our "bank" when it supposedly calls and wants to "double-check" our credit card number, etc.
would it work to post descriptions of the problems that occur w/out identifying specific people or organizations? giving people the tools to avoid situations that are happening to others? there is a good example of this posted by pnta in the mens private section.

creating a "white-list" would seem like an invitation to the enemy on where to focus problems (all of the people involved being human :D ) and the end result may be people screaming that missunderstanding should not have happened because the people or group had supposedly been vetted.

yeah, it sounds like a fulltime job and i would not trust anyone who would want the job.
 
Yeah, I like the way one Messianic guy put it one time. We need to pray more for the gift of discernment.
 
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