Alan Turing royal pardon

[skillsandtea]

About time too. He was a great man and should be recognised as that rather than have the shadow of the sadness in his life. However, I also think that there are many thousands of others who are not famous who should also have the same.

Brilliant news, I'm so glad, thanks for flagging it. He was a great man.

I agree, about time. Was pleased to read this this morning.

This is good news. What happened to Alan Turing was horrendous. But I have to say I agree strongly with Tatchell's comment regarding other men convicted and punished for the same 'crime'.

Saw this on the BBC today and it is long overdue. Just so sad that he (obviously) will never know.

I assume tatchell's comment was that all people convicted of these "crimes" should be pardoned and he is of course 100% right.

The queen could do a statement encompassing all of the people, over the years, saying they are unconditionally pardoned.

Sad that we had to wait for so long. I signed that petition a long time ago. Times change and we should recognise that accordingly for everyone.

Is awesome news. Hopefully Alans case will raise awareness of how badly gays were treated. In particular how nasty chemical castration was. I agree that there are many others who are persecuted in this manner and hopefully the pardon (alongside the pm's apology a few years ago) will raise the profile of both the improvements in gay rights and raise the profile of Alan, up until recently a little known and unsung hero and genius. I'm bias though as he is a relative! /end boast :-)

It was obviously horrendous what happened to him. As it was horrendous for all the other people convicted of the same crime. There is an interesting article on this in the Guardian today. Ordinarily for a crime to be pardoned, the person has to be innocent of the offence and someone with a vested interest (family member) has to request it. Neither of these requirements were met.

"Dr Andrew Hodges, tutorial fellow in mathematics at Wadham College, Oxford, and author of the acclaimed biography Alan Turing: The Enigma, said: "Alan Turing suffered appalling treatment 60 years ago and there has been a very well intended and deeply felt campaign to remedy it in some way. Unfortunately, I cannot feel that such a 'pardon' embodies any good legal principle. If anything, it suggests that a sufficiently valuable individual should be above the law which applies to everyone else."

"Gay rights campaigner Peter Tatchell said the royal pardon was long overdue, but also due to "another 50,000-plus men who were also convicted of consenting, victimless homosexual relationships during the 20th century"."

What happened to equality before the law. In the interests of justice, should a conviction or pardon for a crime be dependent on who you are.

What a load of crap! Politicians are great about apologising to the dead and to ethnic groups, always about the sins of their forefathers and never for their own shortcomings.

Do you really think Alan Turing would care about this were he alive?

I agree with Dr Hodges quoted in the Guardian article above: right outcome but process is wrong.

I think it is good news as it sends out signal of how times have changed. Howeer it is just symbolic. We cannot go back over the whole of history and say those women burned at the stake as witches in the 1500s are pardoned or deserting soldiers in WWII or women who broke the then law to obtain equality etc etc