Darkspilver & The Necessity of Anonymity - Why I Write Under a Pseudonym
Some readers may feel that my use of a pen name is needlessly aggrandizing and symptomatic of a kind of paranoia that is all too common among victims of authoritarian abuse. But recent aggressions of the WTS legal team to uncover the identity of a dissenting Physically-In-Mentally-Out (PIMO) Jehovah’s Witness (JW) on an online discussion forum of over 34,000 ex-JWs and PIMOs shows that my caution is warranted. It is not beyond the leadership of the organization to proactively uncover and disfellowship PIMOs who choose to voice their criticisms of WTS.
This brings us to the story of an anonymous JW Reddit user known only as Darkspilver.
Watch Tower v. Reddit Inc.
Darkspilver was raised as one of Jehovah’s Witnesses but began to question some of the teachings of his family religion. So he shared some of his concerns on the ex/JW Reddit page. His grievances centered around the organization’s practices of eliciting funds from members. (JWs often praise their organization for how removed they are from exploitative financial practices common in mainstream Christianity including passing the plate at church services and telemarketing campaigns.)
Darkspilver posted an image with the caption ‘What Gift Can We Give Jehovah?’ (Watchtower, 2018) that appeared on the back of an issue of Watchtower magazine. Darkspilver stated that he posted the image “to spark discussion about the organization’s tone, message, and fundraising practices” and to demonstrate a “major change from the teaching and practices the Jehovah’s Witnesses had espoused in the past” (Kim, 2019). Additionally, Darkspilver posted a chart that described the kind of personal information that WTS maintains about all their members including advanced medical directives (what JWs call a “Blood Card”), and judicial meeting reports (more about the congregation disciplinary procedures at another time).
WTS legal team took Reddit Inc. to court for breach of copyright laws. According to the presiding justice, Darkspilver’s criticisms were protected under fair use copyright law. But in the course of the proceedings, the WTS legal team subpoenaed Reddit for Dakspilver’s personal identity.
Darkspilver felt that the effort by WTS to lift the mask of his anonymity was so that, regardless of the outcome of the case, he could be held in violation of the organization’s apostasy laws and brought before a judicial committee. WTS legal team denied this stating that WTS was not Darkspilver’s local church and did not have the power to excommunicate him.
The judge did not contest this statement. I would.
The Right to Anonymous Free Speech
Nevertheless, the court recognized that exposing the anonymous Redditt user’s personal identity would severely limit his right to anonymous free speech. Highlighting the reality of the social repercussions from his exposure, the court decided that “Darkspilver has demonstrated significant harms if his identity were revealed publicly or even if it were revealed to Jehovah’s Witnesses in his congregation” (Kim, 2019). Darkspilver was certainly critical of his family religion online and probably no longer believes that WTS is the earthly representation of God’s heavenly organization, but at the time he was not resolved to make the rather permanent decision of formally disassociating and giving up his family and friends forever.
Darkspilver’s legal team appealed the subpoena for his personal identity. In the final outcome, the judge decided that the subpoenaed request for the personal identity of Darkspilver was, in fact, necessary to the copyright law infringement suit leveled by WTS. However, conceding the reality of Darkspilver’s concerns over the harm that could come to him from the powerful religious organization and the possibility that they could proactively disfellowship him, the judge stipulated: “only attorneys of record in this matter may obtain information about Darkspilkver’s identity. Watch Tower’s attorneys of record shall not disclose Darkspilver’s identity to anyone else without approval in a Court Order from this Court” (Kim, 2019).
With support from an understanding legal team at Reddit, Darkspilver’s identity remains anonymous to this day.
No, It’s Not My Real Name
The antagonistic stance of the WTS legal team in Darkspilver’s case sheds light on my decision to withhold my identity. WTS is not above using the full extent of the law to uncover dissenters, remove them from the religion, and coerce their family members into shunning them in perpetuity.
For this reason, my name along with the names of all other characters in my personal memoir have been changed to protect their identities.
References:
1) Watch Tower Bible & Tract Society of Pennsylvania (2018) What Gift Can You Give Jehovah? Watchtower Bible & Tract Society of New York, Inc. Brooklyn, New York. Retrieved from: https://wol.jw.org/en/wol/d/r1/lp-e/2018649?q=what+gift+can+we+give+Jehovah&p=par
2) Kim, S. (2019) Opposition to Motion to Quash. United States District Court for the Northern District of California. Case 3:19-mc-80005-SK. Document 18. Retrieved from: https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/8509534/18/in-re-dmca-subpoena-to-reddit-inc/
