Clear rules for using and contributing to AfterTheChurch.

1. Agreement and eligibility

By accessing the site you agree to follow the provisions that apply to public use. By submitting material or using private submission controls, you expressly accept these Terms and the Privacy Policy. If you do not agree, do not submit material.

Story submissions are intended for people aged 18 or over. A person under 18 may contribute only with verifiable consent from a parent or legal guardian and prior written agreement from the operator. You must have legal capacity to grant the rights and make the promises contained in these Terms.

2. Platform purpose and operator

AfterTheChurch is a survivor-led educational and storytelling project operated from Norway by Ian Shammah. It provides public educational material, moderated personal stories and practical signposting concerning harm in religious settings.

Using the site does not create a therapist–client, doctor–patient, lawyer–client, fiduciary, pastoral, employment, agency or other professional relationship with AfterTheChurch, its owner, host, moderators, contributors or service providers.

3. No emergency or professional advice

The site is not an emergency, crisis, medical, mental-health, legal, financial, safeguarding or law-enforcement service. Information is general and may not reflect your facts, health needs, risk level, jurisdiction or changes in professional guidance.

Do not delay emergency help, medical treatment, safeguarding action or qualified legal advice because of something on this site. Decisions made after reading the site remain the user’s responsibility. For immediate risks, use the Safety and Urgent Help page and an appropriate local professional or emergency service.

4. Survivor stories are contributor content

Survivor stories express the contributor’s recollection, experience or opinion. They are not statements made by AfterTheChurch and do not necessarily reflect the views of the owner, host, moderators or service providers. Moderation does not mean that every factual claim has been independently investigated, verified or endorsed.

Contributors must distinguish, as clearly as reasonably possible, between firsthand experience, information received from another person and personal interpretation. A contributor must not knowingly or recklessly submit false factual allegations.

Privacy labels reduce intentional disclosure on this site but do not guarantee anonymity. A contributor should remove unnecessary dates, locations, roles, images, voice details or distinctive facts that could expose them or another survivor.

5. Ownership and publication licence

Contributors retain ownership of their original material. By submitting it, the contributor grants AfterTheChurch a non-exclusive, worldwide, royalty-free licence to securely store, review, reproduce, format, transcode, caption, excerpt, edit for spelling, clarity, privacy, safety or length, and publish the material through the site under the selected privacy level.

Material changes that could alter meaning should be referred to the contributor for approval where reasonably possible. AfterTheChurch will not sell a contributor’s story or license it for advertising, documentary use or third-party commercial publication without separate permission.

The contributor may withdraw the publication licence for future use by unpublishing or deleting the submission. Limited copies may be retained where necessary for backups, security, compliance or legal claims. Withdrawal cannot control copies already made by readers, search engines, archives or unaffiliated third parties.

6. Acceptable use

You must not use the site to:

• threaten, harass, intimidate, stalk or coordinate retaliation against a contributor or any other person;
• identify or attempt to identify an anonymous contributor, or publish another person’s private contact, location, health or authentication information;
• impersonate someone, submit content on their behalf without authority or misrepresent your connection to an organisation;
• upload material that is unlawful, defamatory, maliciously false, discriminatory, sexually exploitative, privacy-invasive or that infringes copyright, confidentiality or image rights;
• upload malware, attempt unauthorised access, test vulnerabilities without written permission, evade rate limits or interfere with the service;
• scrape private areas, build identification profiles, republish stories in bulk or use content to train a model or dataset without written permission;
• submit recordings, photographs or documents unless you have the necessary rights, permissions and lawful basis to share them;
• use the platform as a substitute for reporting an emergency or an immediate child or adult safeguarding risk.

7. Moderation and editorial discretion

Submission does not guarantee review, publication, continued hosting or a response within a particular time. To protect contributors, affected people and the service, AfterTheChurch may request evidence or clarification, redact details, add context or warnings, restrict access, refuse, unpublish, preserve or delete material.

These decisions may be based on safety, privacy, consent, accuracy, legal risk, available moderation capacity, editorial relevance or a breach of these Terms. The operator has no general duty to monitor every item or investigate every allegation, but may act when a credible concern is received.

8. Complaints, correction and takedown requests

If content identifies you, infringes your rights, creates a safety risk or is materially inaccurate, email sha2mmah@gmail.com with “Legal notice” in the subject line. Include:

• the exact page address and the specific words or media concerned;
• the legal, privacy, safety or factual basis for the request;
• your relationship to the material and the result requested;
• a safe way to contact you and a statement that the information in your notice is accurate to the best of your knowledge.

Do not send passports, medical records or other sensitive proof in the first email. We may temporarily restrict content while assessing a credible notice. We may share the substance of a complaint with the contributor where necessary for a fair review, but will limit contact details and sensitive information where reasonably possible.

9. Website intellectual property

Except for contributor-owned stories and third-party material, AfterTheChurch owns or licenses the site design, original text, branding, selection and arrangement of material. You may read, link to and quote brief extracts for personal, educational, critical or other uses permitted by law with appropriate attribution.

No permission is granted to copy the site substantially, remove attribution, use the branding as your own, sell site material or republish survivor stories outside the limits of applicable law and the contributor’s rights.

10. Third-party links and services

The site links to independent helplines, authorities, research and other services. A link is provided for convenience and does not create control, partnership, endorsement or responsibility for that third party. Their content, availability, confidentiality, eligibility, charges and privacy practices may change.

Anonymous contributor sessions, administrator authentication, storage and hosting depend on third-party infrastructure, including Supabase and Vercel. Those providers have their own terms, security measures and service limitations.

11. No warranties and no promise of uninterrupted availability

To the maximum extent permitted by law, the site and its content are provided “as is” and “as available.” AfterTheChurch does not promise that content is complete, error-free, suitable for a particular decision, continuously available, secure against every attack or preserved indefinitely.

Contact information and professional guidance can change. Users should confirm urgent or important information directly with the relevant official service.

12. Limitation of liability

13. Contributor responsibility for submitted material

A contributor confirms that, to the best of their knowledge, their submission is based on their genuine experience, they have the right to submit it, and any uploaded recording, image, document or third-party material is used lawfully with necessary permission.

To the extent permitted by law, a contributor is responsible for direct losses and third-party claims caused by their knowing or reckless breach of those confirmations or their intentional unlawful use of the platform. This does not make a contributor responsible for an editorial change made solely by AfterTheChurch or for a claim caused by the operator’s own unlawful conduct.

14. Access restriction, termination and changes

AfterTheChurch may restrict submission or management access where reasonably necessary for security, legal compliance, investigation of abuse or protection of another person. Where safe and lawful, the user will be told the reason and given a way to request review.

We may change or discontinue features and update these Terms. Material changes affecting contributors will be communicated by a reasonable method where possible. Continued use after the stated effective date constitutes acceptance where the law allows; new consent will be requested where required.

15. Governing law and disputes

These Terms and non-contractual disputes concerning the site are governed by Norwegian law. The parties should first try to resolve a dispute in good faith by written notice. Subject to mandatory law, Norwegian courts have jurisdiction.

This clause does not remove mandatory consumer, data-protection or other rights that apply in the country where a user lives, nor any right to complain to a competent supervisory authority.

16. General legal terms

If a provision is invalid or unenforceable, it will be limited to the minimum extent necessary and the remaining provisions will continue. A failure to enforce a term is not a waiver. These Terms, the Privacy Policy and any specific written contributor agreement form the entire agreement concerning use of the site and replace earlier statements on the same subject.

Headings and summaries help navigation but do not override the full wording. No person other than the user and the operator receives a contractual right under these Terms unless mandatory law provides otherwise.