Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2015 April 13

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April 13

"Walk of Shame" song

This question has been moved to the Entertainment desk. --Viennese Waltz 12:18, 13 April 2015 (UTC)

Jehovah's Witnesses bible studies

Jehovah's Witnesses are known for their door-to-door preaching, which can then be followed by Bible studies with interested people (who I will refer to as "students"). It is mentioned in a number of articles regarding the Witnesses that Witness bible studies are directed in such a way that students will be directed towards Witness beliefs. What happens if a student is interested in the study and actively participates in it but does not end up agreeing to Witness doctrines, or if the student even develops ideas independent of Witness doctrines? For example, what if a Bible study student during the study feels that the Witness doctrine that Jesus was executed on a torture stake rather than on a cross is "un-Biblical"? Does the study cease or will the Witness persist until the student is converted? This question only refers to students who develop Bible beliefs which are not part of Witness doctrine but nevertheless remains interested in continuing the study, it does not refer to students who have lost interest in the study. While the article Jehovah's Witnesses#Evangelism mentions that studies are discontinued if the student is not willing to be a member, it does not state what happens if the student is willing to be a member but develops doctrines independent of Witness beliefs. Narutolovehinata5 ^tccsdnew 01:44, 13 April 2015 (UTC)

@Wavelength: @Jeffro77: Narutolovehinata5 ^tccsdnew 01:47, 13 April 2015 (UTC)

Jehovah's Witnesses have indexed information about Bible studies at http://wol.jw.org/en/wol/d/r1/lp-e/1200270822. I have quickly scanned the list, without finding the answer, but I am posting the link for the benefit of other editors who may be able to find the answer by using it as a meta-reference.

—Wavelength (talk) 02:02, 13 April 2015 (UTC)

According to http://www.jw.org/en/video-bible-study/, a Bible student is not obligated to become one of Jehovah's Witnesses.

—Wavelength (talk) 03:12, 13 April 2015 (UTC)

The intention of the JW 'Bible study' program is for 'students' to 'make progress toward baptism' as members of the group. Whilst becoming a member is not obligatory (particularly since in secular countries, religious groups in general have no legal right to compel a person to do anything at all), making converts is quite definitely the study program's purpose.

A 'student' who openly rejects core JW teachings—such as the JW belief that Jesus died on a single-beam 'torture stake'—would not be accepted as a member. (Similarly, members who adamantly reject core doctrines are ousted and shunned.) A person who expressed during the study program that they would not accept a doctrine would usually be deemed 'unprogressive', and the study would be terminated.--Jeffro77 (talk) 07:45, 13 April 2015 (UTC)

It is worth adding that there is variation, both regionally and individually, as to what degree of 'rejection' of a doctrine by a 'student' would result in termination of the study. A JW Bible study with a 'student' who very adamantly rejects JW doctrines would typically be terminated, but more latitude may be granted where a JW study conductor believes that the 'student' is simply 'having trouble understanding' a particular point.--Jeffro77 (talk) 08:04, 13 April 2015 (UTC)

Our Kingdom Ministry, October 1988:

To guide Bible students progressively to the point of discipleship requires forethought and good planning. Studies should be started and conducted with a clear purpose in mind, that of helping the student to become a productive disciple of Christ Jesus. ... If a student is not making meaningful progress after you have patiently aided him over a reasonable period of time, it may be best to use the time to better advantage searching for deserving ones. (Matt. 10:11-13) Depending on the circumstances, it may be wise to discontinue the study.

--Jeffro77 (talk) 08:44, 13 April 2015 (UTC)

The question "How long should we study with a progressive Bible student?" is answered at http://wol.jw.org/en/wol/d/r1/lp-e/202011126.

—Wavelength (talk) 18:44, 13 April 2015 (UTC)

The article you have linked is about 'progressive' Bible 'students' and whether a Bible study should continue after baptism as a JW. It is not relevant to Narutolovehinata5's questions about studies conducted with people who do not accept core Witness doctrines.--Jeffro77 (talk) 21:36, 13 April 2015 (UTC)

pruning the dynasty

In some monarchies the succession is limited in range, either to descendants of a specified recent monarch (e.g. Norway) or to a small number of steps of kinship from the late monarch (e.g. Monaco). What's the point of this? If no surviving candidate exists from that limited pool, does the throne remain eternally vacant, or is the parliament empowered and expected to choose a new monarch, or what? —Tamfang (talk) 06:09, 13 April 2015 (UTC)

It would be speculation to deal with it, but based on historical precedent, it would be the legislature of these respective countries which would establish new succession law should all living kin be dead. It took the UK Parliament some time to settle on Sophia of Hanover and her descendants once they realized that had invalidated all the close living relatives of the Stuarts by demanding that the throne pass to a Protestant. When Sweden was left without a royal house at the death of Charles XIII of Sweden, the Riksdag elected a French military officer as their next king, establishing their current royal House of Bernadotte. France fought a major war (see the War of the Three Henries) when the Valois branch died out, and what was left was some VERY distant cousins that no one could agree on who was the better candidate. But generally in modern Constitutional Monarchies, the job would fall to Parliament to designate a successor. --Jayron32 15:07, 13 April 2015 (UTC)

I looked at War of the Three Henries. It says one of the three was the last king of the senior branch, so his death could not have started the war. —Tamfang (talk) 08:29, 15 April 2015 (UTC)

As far as why they would have a limited number of successors:

1) Being a potential successor means you have to follow a certain code of conduct. (That is, no Paris Hilton-like behavior.)

2) With such requirements, it's also reasonable for the potential successors to expect to be paid an allowance. Obviously the nation needs to limit the number of people on the payroll, for budgetary reasons. StuRat (talk) 15:42, 13 April 2015 (UTC)

I believe the point is to avoid the accession of an unprepared or undesirable person. Take a look at the 2012 line of succession to the Dutch throne. The Queen's nephews were in the line, but their children were not. The restriction ensured that, if the elder nephew were to die or otherwise become disqualified (along with everyone preceding him in the line), the younger nephew would become heir presumptive. Without the restriction, the heir presumptive in such situation would be a grandniece. The nephews were born during the reign of their grandmother and were raised as princes; the grandniece was born during the reign of her grandaunt and was raised as a private citizen. If, however, a nephew were to ascend, his children would automatically assume appropriate places in the line of succession. (Though now I wonder whether the children of the elder nephew, if dead or otherwise disqualified, would enter the line of succession upon the accession of the younger nephew/their uncle. The only thing that kept them out of the line was distance from the reigning monarch - which would no longer be an issue. On the other hand, they were skipped, and would awkwardly be senior in primogeniture to both their uncle and his children.) I also mentioned undesirable people - see Wilhelmina of the Netherlands#Enthronement and marriage for an example. The parliament would rather have had the throne become vacant upon Wilhelmina's death without issue than see a distant German relative of hers ascend it. Surtsicna (talk) 21:32, 13 April 2015 (UTC)

Paying employees in hard currency

I hate when the refdesk is semi-protected, but I understand the necessity. Grrr, disruptive editors are annoying

My question is: In the USA, Australia, or Great Britain, is it legal for a business to pay an regular employee in hard currency, ie. notes and coins, as opposed to a cheque or bank transfer?

If the answer is "no", when did it become illegal?

I am not referring to any attempt to avoid paying tax. Rather, I'm referring to situations where all payments are properly declared to the tax authorities. I'm simply asking whether the law demands that payments by businesses to employees be "cashless", and if yes, since when (even if it's decades ago).

Note that I am neither an employer, nor asking on behalf of one, so this isn't a request for legal advice. Eliyohub (talk) 15:51, 13 April 2015 (UTC)

To my knowledge that's legal in the US. Indeed, lower-paid workers may not have a bank account, so paying them by check is most unwelcome, as then they have to go to a check cashing place and pay a fee. StuRat (talk) 15:59, 13 April 2015 (UTC)

@StuRat: FYI, many local (a.k.a. not chains) grocery stores will also cash a paycheck for free. Especially if the person is using a portion of the check to buy groceries. I've seen my local market do it. And I used to work in a general store that would do it. Dismas|^(talk) 06:24, 14 April 2015 (UTC)

[1], [2] and [3] confirm there's nothing wrong with paying employees in cash per se in the US, at least according to the IRS (amd probably the entirety of the US Federal government). No idea if there are any state laws that could cause problems. Nil Einne (talk) 16:12, 13 April 2015 (UTC)

[4] and [5] confirm it's fine in Australia as well, again according to the ATO or probably the entirety of the Australian Commonwealth Government, no idea about any possible state or territorial laws. Nil Einne (talk) 16:16, 13 April 2015 (UTC)

Note however, that large companies don't like to operate that way, as keeping large amounts of cash on hand is a temptation both to theft and embezzlement, necessitating hiring guards, etc. But, for paying one's nanny, for example, there's no such problem. (I wonder how banks pay their tellers. It would seem silly to give them checks, which they then immediately cash right there, but that might be exactly what they do.) StuRat (talk) 16:20, 13 April 2015 (UTC)

Many large companies use direct deposit. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 16:31, 13 April 2015 (UTC)

Bearing in mind that what you'll get is the net after deductions. As long as the IRS and the state DOR gets their cut, they probably don't care. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 16:21, 13 April 2015 (UTC)

These [6] [7] strongly imply it's also okay in the UK. These non RS [8] [9] [10] [11] directly say or in some cases strong imply it's okay in the UK. (I would guess they all at least apply to England and Wales.) Nil Einne (talk) 16:26, 13 April 2015 (UTC)

BTW although you didn't ask about it, in NZ you're legally required to pay with cash, unless you've agreed to a different method and it's stated in the employment contract [12] [13]. Also all these results were found with a simple search for 'paying employee in cash', except for the extra UK ones where I limited results to the UK and the second NZ one, where I used a different search string. One more comment, in relation to StuRat's comment above, I wouldn't be surprised if in UK, Australia and NZ, it's actually more common to pay with cash than with cheque nowadays. That's including all those who are dodging tax, but I wonder even if you exclude those, cash may still be higher than cheque. The most common method would be by bank transfer/direct deposit. I can't imagine many companies large or small would choose to pay by cheque. Perhaps a few old people may still prefer to be paid by cheque, but I think even those few people who still sometimes use cheques themselves for payment, will be fine with bank transfers for their wages. Nil Einne (talk) 16:32, 13 April 2015 (UTC)

One more point, while the factors mentioned above (embezzlement and theft) would be a concern, the biggest advantage for bank transfers, and to a lesser extent cheques is probably simplicity. You don't need someone to count out the amount, you don't need the employee being paid to sign something confirming they received their wages. Particularly for a large company, once it's set up it happens nearly automatically compared to what would be a fairly complicated process if you need to pay a large number of employees with cash. Nil Einne (talk) 16:59, 13 April 2015 (UTC)

I used to work on the payroll system for a company that paid some of its manual workers in cash. One of its tasks was to calculate the breakdown of the notes and coins to be put in each employee's wage packet (by hand), so that the company knew how many of each denomination would be needed that week. An extra complication was that we had to avoid using only large-denomination notes, so if someone's net pay came to say £40 (it was a long time ago!) they would get the £40 as £20 + £10 + £5 + £5 (or something - it might even have been £20 + £10 + £5 + 5 x £1 notes or coins). AndrewWTaylor (talk) 17:17, 13 April 2015 (UTC)

(ec) It used to be the case that employers were obliged (or at least they couldn't refuse) to pay some (manual?) workers in cash, under the Truck Acts. This was to prevent the situation where workers were paid in tokens which could only be used in an overpriced "company shop". I don't know if this is still in force, and if so to what extent people take advantage of it. It's certainly still legal to pay in cash, subject to statutory deductions, as per Nil Einne's links. AndrewWTaylor (talk) 16:41, 13 April 2015 (UTC)

At the very least, one of the sources [14] suggests in the UK you probably have no choice but to pay by cash if an employee for more than a year wants to be paid that way. (If it's less than a year, then they can't bring a claim for unfair dismissal so there's less they can do if you refuse.) Nil Einne (talk) 16:49, 13 April 2015 (UTC)

• One question, you describe notes as hard currency. The term hard currency is usually used for gold or silver coin or money redeemable in silver or coin. Second, many private restaurants in the US will cash their employees (at least wait-staff) from the till since waiter's checks are small, and it is convenient for both the wait-staff to be paid immediately, and the manager to carry checks, rather than cash to the bank, and risk robbery on the way. μηδείς (talk) 17:51, 13 April 2015 (UTC)

Nope. A 'hard currency' is one that is widely traded, and recognised as freely convertible to others - though in the context used in this thread, it simply means 'cash'. AndyTheGrump (talk) 00:55, 14 April 2015 (UTC)

The "article" you have linked to is unsupported crap. Hard money is money backed by gold or silver. Money not backed by anything tangible (not redeemable in some unit of a physical substance) is fiat money. You assertion's not even worth refuting. μηδείς (talk) 05:34, 14 April 2015 (UTC)

While you're free to use terms in obscure way that few people do any more, you shouldn't mislead people in to thinking your nowadays non standard usage is standard. Whatever hard money means (a term never mentioned by anyone before you and BB), hard currency is generally used in the manner mentioned by AndyTheGrump or our "unsupported crap" article, as these 27 refs will attest [15] [16] [17] [18] [19] [20] [21] [22] [23] [24] [25] [26] [27] [28] [29] [30] [31] [32] [33] [34] [35] [36] [37] [38] [39] [40] [41] Nil Einne (talk) 13:31, 14 April 2015 (UTC)

P.S. In the interest of full disclosure, perhaps I should mention I did come across a few results which used the term in the same manner as Medeis. But for general searches it was only a tiny percentage, IIRC and none looked to be RS. I came across a few more when I specifically looked to see if I could find any using the term in the manner most other people do from the Austrian school of thought. I didn't pay much attention to whether any where RS. Nil Einne (talk) 08:15, 15 April 2015 (UTC)

The term "hard money" originally referred to "specie" (coins) as opposed to paper (currency).[42] Given the electronic nature of much of the money supply nowadays, the lines may have blurred. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 01:02, 14 April 2015 (UTC)

Further, a "hard money policy" when it didn't mean actual hard money meant a central banking policy tagged to a hard standard, such as the Federal Reserve policy of Paul Volker which tracked the dollar in gold, even if it didn't redeem the dollar in gold. William Jennings Bryant and his populist "cross of gold" campaign for inflation would otherwise have been meaningless. μηδείς (talk) 01:45, 17 April 2015 (UTC)

In South Africa physical paper cheques (checks) are actually rarely used. None of the major banks routinely give account-holders a cheque book, if you want one you have to specifically order it. It's been at least ten years since I last even touched a paper cheque. Even Social Security payments are done electronically, beneficiaries are issued a specific debit card that can be used in shops or at ATMs even if they don't have bank accounts. Roger (Dodger67) (talk) 06:15, 17 April 2015 (UTC)

Recording of FDR speaking German?

According to this list President Franklin Roosevelt spoke German. Is there any recording of him speaking the language? --Jerchel (talk) 19:40, 13 April 2015 (UTC)

unsourced speculation - see WP:NOTFORUM
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
If there was, he might well have destroyed it, as any association with Germany in the time he was in politics would have been bad for his career. The British Saxe-Coburg and Gotha royals changed their name to the House of Windsor during this period for the same reason. StuRat (talk) 21:30, 13 April 2015 (UTC) Inappropriate (and obscene) discussion for Ref Desk. The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it. Wow. {{citationfuckingneeded}}. You just make shit up and let it fly sometimes Stu. "He might well have destroyed it" is not the kind of stuff that passes for a properly referenced answer around here. --Jayron32 22:43, 13 April 2015 (UTC) No, "He destroyed it" would need a citation. I've made no statement of fact other than the one I provided a reference for. StuRat (talk) 22:55, 13 April 2015 (UTC) Is there some part of the concept that 'this is not a forum' that you find difficult to understand? AndyTheGrump (talk) 01:02, 14 April 2015 (UTC) I commented on the chances of being able to find a recording, which is precisely what the OP asked about. And criticisms of the responses of others are inappropriate here. Take your comments to a forum. StuRat (talk) 02:32, 14 April 2015 (UTC)

Can't find anything here or here or elsewhere on the web. His knowledge of German impressed Albert Einstein - maybe a recording of their conversations exists, but I haven't find one. His knowledge was historically important, because FDR read Hitler's Mein Kampf in German early on, rather than bowdlerized early translations, his reading helped convince FDR that "We are dealing with an insane man".John Z (talk) 18:49, 14 April 2015 (UTC)

Yup - I couldn't find any evidence of recordings either, though there are plenty of sources for his skill with the language. AndyTheGrump (talk) 18:53, 14 April 2015 (UTC)

Not what was asked, but the FDR Library lists one speech held in German by Eleanor Roosevelt on 23 October, 1948. "Address to German women in the UN - Stuttgart, West Germany", tape # 50-106:1. Recorded Speeches and Utterances by Eleanor Roosevelt, 1933-1962. (I found no online version, and it looks like you'd have to order it). ---Sluzzelin talk 10:59, 15 April 2015 (UTC)