In a recent article by the editor of Spectrum I noticed conflicting quotes attributed to President Ted Wilson. The article: Secrecy: The Adventist Experience used as it's example a supposed quote from the October 9 2017 GC meeting which was given as (emphasis added):
Since the editor would not correct the problem I decided to research and see which quote was accurate. The linked quote is more accurate but it is not in itself accurate. Possibly it was from notes taken at the meeting as the article was published the day after the meeting Bonnie Dwyer did not have the full recording to get the quote right. That, however, is not the case for an article written 2 years later, the video of the meeting is available on Youtube you can find it here starting at 2:32:40 and going until about 2:40. When you hear the recording you see that those few people mentioned were the handful that were tallying the votes. When you have leaks from people who are supposed to tally votes that is not a good in any situation.
The following is my transcription without the pauses and false starts of live impromptu speech from the video 2:38:29:
"Now the interesting thing to me is and I think this is a very highly sensitive situation. that first of all the vote which you mentioned as being a vote which did not approve of those who were in the presence of our meeting. That was only known by a very small handful of people who are counting the votes. We then immediately indicated that there were votes that had come in from those that had been surveyed, and that was the vote announced to the group. I announced it in two different buses, It's very curious to me that information has been leaked..."
Anyway, that is pretty far away from you weren't supposed to know that. Just to be clear here he is addressing the last part of Randy Roberts statement as recorded in Spectrum that was:
"General Conference President Ted Wilson about how the recommendation had come to the committee, noting that the vote of the General Conference and Division Officers (GCDO) had included (forbidden) proxy votes. “You weren’t supposed to know that,” Wilson said, as he began his explanation about a vote of the committee taken while GCDO was traveling and when some members had left to handle crises in their home territories..."The specific quote being “You weren’t supposed to know that,”. I commented on the Spectrum Website comments section that the link the article gave to the report did not say “You weren’t supposed to know that,”. Using the article linked to the quote was:
The discussions were very positive on getting to an appropriate goal. We canvassed those there and those who were not there. A very few who said they did not want to vote because they had not seen the document. The results are what you indicated. The vote that you mentioned. The fact you mentioned was only known to a very few people. There have been leaks. People have misused information that has caused this to be very flammable. Private information has been taken and misused again. One final thing, the chair did not vote.”So in the comments, I commented a second time:
I guess I need to make this clearer. Which quote is real and which quote is not? Or are they both wrong. “You weren’t supposed to know that,” or “The fact you mentioned was only known to a very few people” Those are not the same! I think inaccurate quotes are very poor journalism.The powers that be did nothing, no attempt to answer, no attempt to correct the original article and then it occurred to me that these articles are not meant to be accurate they are meant to please a certain group of people, When the cause is more important than truth, accuracy is of little importance. No other commenters addressed the quotation. This even though that quote was the very foundation of the supposed secrecy in the article. The secrecy of the SDA church is not my concern it is truth and accuracy. If you don't have either of those two things, articles are really useless for information purposes. They may serve well for propaganda or emotional arguments to people who already feel the way the author does but little else. I have noticed this more and more in the Progressive Adventist media mainly Adventist Today and Spectrum. Facts are a minor concern to their ideological agenda. Frankly, the errors are so numerous I could not possibly find the time to point them all out. But I wanted to point this journalistic malfeasance out before I actually completely wean myself off of reading these websites. If I can't trust the information and especially if I can't trust things that are stated as actual quotes of people. There is little point in spending the time to read them.
Since the editor would not correct the problem I decided to research and see which quote was accurate. The linked quote is more accurate but it is not in itself accurate. Possibly it was from notes taken at the meeting as the article was published the day after the meeting Bonnie Dwyer did not have the full recording to get the quote right. That, however, is not the case for an article written 2 years later, the video of the meeting is available on Youtube you can find it here starting at 2:32:40 and going until about 2:40. When you hear the recording you see that those few people mentioned were the handful that were tallying the votes. When you have leaks from people who are supposed to tally votes that is not a good in any situation.
The following is my transcription without the pauses and false starts of live impromptu speech from the video 2:38:29:
"Now the interesting thing to me is and I think this is a very highly sensitive situation. that first of all the vote which you mentioned as being a vote which did not approve of those who were in the presence of our meeting. That was only known by a very small handful of people who are counting the votes. We then immediately indicated that there were votes that had come in from those that had been surveyed, and that was the vote announced to the group. I announced it in two different buses, It's very curious to me that information has been leaked..."
Anyway, that is pretty far away from you weren't supposed to know that. Just to be clear here he is addressing the last part of Randy Roberts statement as recorded in Spectrum that was:
“But there is actually something that concerns me even more, and that is my understanding that a previous vote on the matter actually lost by a count of 29-26, following which several who were not in attendance, some of whom had not been able to read the document, were asked to vote. It was that vote, then, that passed by a count of 36-35.There may be skullduggery afoot here but you will never prove or even make a good case if you can't provide accurate information.
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