To think it's wrong to pardon Alan Turing and no one else?

[Sixweekstowait]

Just because he made a great contribution to the war effort? There are thousands of men alive living with the same conviction - it's elitist that he's singled out

'Perceived war efforts'??

This isn't the place, but it's much more complex than is made out. The battle of the Atlantic is at least as much about mass production, convoy tactics and radar as it's about crypto.

Here's a very good summary.

The logo of Apple Computer is often erroneously referred to as a tribute to Alan Turing, with the bite mark a reference to his method of suicide.[123] Both the designer of the logo[124] and the company deny that there is any homage to Turing in the design of the logo.[125] Stephen Fry has recounted asking Steve Jobs whether the design was intentional, saying that Jobs' response was, "God, we wish it were."[126]

From wiki

I can't help feel the pardon is patronising, it implies he did something "wrong"

I don't think he should be 'pardoned' at all - I think it's really offensive, actually. Agree with stubbs.

The word "pardon" is a problem but it's all there is, when it was first used it meant "you didn't do it" and in law-jargon it still does.

Mmm. Not sure I agree with that at all.

In the UK a pardon is a forgivness and a reduction in penalty - it means you are still guilty of the crime but are forgiven - pretty meaningless

Yes caroldecker but the word goes back hundreds of years and did originally mean that you were not guilty. It means something else now to everyone except to the bloody lawyers, and guess what I do for a living.

We need another name - Royal Exoneration? - but until we get one a pardon will have to do.

Yes, I agree. Why does he get special treatment. And if you are going to give pardons for historic crimes that are no longer considered a crime, how far back do you go? What about anyone convicted when abortion and attempted suicide were illegal? (I'd imagine the numbers were small, but still.) If we are going to apply modern standards to historic cases then everyone tried in the C18th deserves a pardon as none except the most wealthy had access to legal advice. Or in the C17th and early C18th the women who were assumed to have killed their babies if they died at birth and were illegitimate - they had to prove they had not killed the child rather than the crown having to prove they had. What about all the people imprisoned in completely inhumane conditions up to fairly modern times? Given that we don't have the death penalty any more, do we need to pardon all those people as well?

Its unfair to have picked him out of all the others, and it sets an uncomfortable precedent to give him an official pardon for offences that were considered a crime at the time. The government had already officially apologised about his treatment. Why not leave it at that?

Um ... when did it mean you weren't guilty?

I don't doubt you, but it must be a bloody long time because in medieval England, a pardon definitely meant you'd been forgiven, not that you were not guilty!

I think it would be much better to issue an apology. That's also retrospective but much better than 'pardon' or 'exoneration'.

In mediaeval times a "pardon" meant that you got your estates back. Since for crimes important enough to merit notice (upper-class crimes) if you weren't executed confiscation was all that happened - imprisonment was only until trial - return of your estates carried the implication that you weren't guilty. If you'd been executed as well your family got the estates back.

But I agree LRD a general apology for all convicted of such "crimes" would be better. That way there would be no need to consider the age of the other person involved case-by-case.

No, it's primary meaning was that your sins were forgiven; it did also mean pardon for a criminal offense.

If you don't believe me, look at the dictionary entry.

quod.lib.umich.edu/cgi/m/mec/med-idx?size=First+100&type=headword&q1=pardoun&rgxp=constrained

I'm not sure that mediaeval thinkers made quite the same distinctions we do. But let us apologise to all those poor bastards.

I don't think it's relevant at all.

The word means what it means now. And someone should have thought of what it implies.

I agree - poor bastards.

I find his pardon legally and historically meaningless. He is long dead and the people who treated him so shabbily are as well. It is essentially a way for the current generation to assauge their own consciences about one of the unhappier acts of our recent past without having to do anything about how that past continues to affect thousands of people still alive.

You can't change what happened or rewrite history. But you can change the present by offering reparations to some fifty thousand men still alive who suffered because of these laws. And the country could put greater preessure on commonwealth nations who still convict people under similar colonial era laws to stop.

But all of that would take money and diplomatic risk. This just took a few parliamentary debates and some press relreleases.

YY, agree completely.

And the country could put greater preessure on commonwealth nations who still convict people under similar colonial era laws to stop.

For example, members of the general synod of the Church of England could stop campaigning to keep homosexuality illegal in the West Indies (presumably, Chichester, who elected the member, has an excess of violent homophobes), and Justin Welby, the Archbishop of Canterbury, could stop comparing homosexuality to wife beating.

Holy shit, friday16, when and in what words did Welby say anything of the sort?

Scan to 23:00. After the self-pitying bullshit in which he claims to have been in personal danger for trying to prevent same-sex marriage, he lists other things that "dishonour marriage", first of which is violence.

So he equates same-sex marriage to domestic violence.

If that's not what he means, he should try to articulate his thoughts more clearly. Isn't that his job?

andrewofgg

This quote is from a speech in Nairobi in October.

"I spoke against the law in Parliament at great personal cost and became the object of much hatred. But not only that law dishonours marriage. Violence in marriage, adultery, and porn dishonour marriage

The law he refers to is same-sex marriage act

Not quite linking homosexuality and wife beating, but does suggest that my marriage is equally dishonoured if my neighbours are married homosexuals or a husband and wife team where the wife is beaten daily.

Not convinced I agree with him

Erm ... I think he means abusive spouses dishonour marriage, not their partners!

And they do.

Same-sex marriage doesn't and he's gobshite for saying that and, as you say, for the self-pitying stuff.

I am deeply unimpressed by Welby trying to curry favour in Kenya by bigging up his opposition to same-sex marriage.

100% agree with whoever said that the British government should make recompense for previous homophobic laws by clearing the criminal records of living men who were convicted of homosexual acts, rather than 'pardoning' someone who is long dead.

Thank you caroldecker and I am bloody horrified.

The difficulty is that the law changes regularly and not retrospectively. Unfortunately, these men where correctly prosecuted under the law as it then was, and you cannot change history. The same as if you introduce a law, you cannot prosecute people who did the 'offence' prior to the law change. This is why some criminal sentences are different for people who committed a crime in the past as sentencing rules have changed since they committed the offence.