>>4017334 (PB)
But I thought Jim Berg are one in the same?
Freemasons are attracting younger members thanks to less secrecy and tapping into social media
The historically "secret society" of the Freemasons has been mired in conspiracy theories and controversy for years, but young Australians are looking past that and choosing to become part of the fraternity.
In the past, the Freemasons' initiation process was highly secretive.
Members had to be approached to join, had to meet certain criteria, and a guard stood outside lodge meetings to ensure only male members could attend.
Freemason Alec Ayling, in South Australia's Riverland, said it had been daunting attending his first meeting.
"If you were to join, you were blindfolded before you came in and you're conducted around certain areas and had things explained, and then you're sort of brought to light," he said.
Since declining membership has led to fraternities closing, rules around membership have evolved from being secret and at times discriminatory to being advertised as welcoming people from all walks of life.
Grand lodges in Victoria and New South Wales have pointed to social media campaigns as the success behind recruiting new members.
Several have reported a 10–15 per cent increase in young people aged between 18-30 joining their group.
In the Grand Lodge of South Australia and the Northern Territory, 75 per cent of its 115 new members over the past year were in the 20–30-year-old age bracket.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-11-21/young-people-joining-freemasons-connect-changing-world/10508708
Black Man Killed by Officer in Alabama Mall Shooting Was Not the Gunman, Police Now Say
The police in Alabama said an officer fatally shot a 21-year-old black man on Thursday night who they said shot at least one person at a mall near Birmingham, turning a Thanksgiving holiday shopping scene into chaos.
But on Friday the police said the man actually wasn’t the gunman and the true gunman remained at large.
The Hoover Police Department said on Twitter that the man who was killed, Emantic Fitzgerald Bradford Jr., “may have been involved in some aspect” of an altercation at the mall, the Riverchase Galleria in Hoover, Ala., that preceded the shooting.
But, they said, he “likely did not fire the rounds” that struck an 18-year-old man as they had originally indicated. Another victim, a 12-year-old girl, was an “innocent bystander,” the police said. Both were hospitalized but their conditions on Saturday were unavailable.
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/24/us/alabama-mall-shooting.html