Computer pioneer and Nazi codebreaker Alan Turing is given posthumous royal pardon

taxslave

Hall of Fame Member
Nov 25, 2008
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Yeah? Who says so, apart from those with early 21st century sensibilities? This is yet another example of people thinking that today's sensbilities applied to yesteryear. I wonder how many people of the time would have agreed with you that it was "an unjust law".

And whether just or unjust, it was the law of the land and he broke it. If you pardon Turing for breaking the law then you can pardon everybody in history that has ever broken the law. Why don't be pardon the Yorkshire Ripper or the Great Train Robbers?




In that case, why don't we pardon every person who has had sex with an under age child? Nature didn't intend there to be sexual consent laws.

Are you looking for an excuse for your pedophilia?

Quite often a very stupid reason for incarcerating a person. In the City of Winnipeg it is against the law to carry water down the street in open buckets between the months of November and April.

Now that is truly stupid because it would be a block of ice anyway.
 

Dexter Sinister

Unspecified Specialist
Oct 1, 2004
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I think pardoning Turing is wrong. A Great British hero he may be, but he broke the law.
The logical end of that line of argument is that nobody should be pardoned, ever, for anything. Yes he broke the law, but it was a bad law that caused grievous harm to many people, and the fact that it's no longer the law reflects that, now we know better. You've also tried to argue that we shouldn't do this, but the pardon is a quite explicit application of contemporary standards and mores to history, we (society I mean) do that kind of thing all the time. That line of argument produces the conclusion, for example, that we should not judge the anti-Semitism that produced extermination camps around the middle of the previous century as a bad thing, because it was considered normal and acceptable by the people who implemented it at the time. That's intellectually paralyzing, eventually you'll end up unable to justify any judgment about anything in the past.
 

damngrumpy

Executive Branch Member
Mar 16, 2005
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What is right and wrong doesn't come with an expirery date and it doesn't come
with a new date either. Apartide was wrong when it started and wrong when it
finished and this case is no different. Britain brought some good things to the
world but those great things were diminished because they brought slavery and
tyranny to millions over the centuries.
Here is a man who serves his country with distinction and he gets treated the way
he did. People in Britain should be ashamed to deal with this as a pardon they
should deal with it as a we are sorry for the criminal act we committed. Any
person with sensitivity period should hang their head in shame over this. The
arrogance to suggest a pardon when the accused was violated and did nothing
wrong. I am surprised the State had the gaul to even bring the subject up.
Anyone who believes having an empire at all is well for the reasons of sensitivity
I won't use the insult. Merry Christmas. Britain did give us ****ens and his stories
of sensitivity so there is some redeeming value there at least.
 

Goober

Hall of Fame Member
Jan 23, 2009
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The logical end of that line of argument is that nobody should be pardoned, ever, for anything. Yes he broke the law, but it was a bad law that caused grievous harm to many people, and the fact that it's no longer the law reflects that, now we know better. You've also tried to argue that we shouldn't do this, but the pardon is a quite explicit application of contemporary standards and mores to history, we (society I mean) do that kind of thing all the time. That line of argument produces the conclusion, for example, that we should not judge the anti-Semitism that produced extermination camps around the middle of the previous century as a bad thing, because it was considered normal and acceptable by the people who implemented it at the time. That's intellectually paralyzing, eventually you'll end up unable to justify any judgment about anything in the past.

The Holocaust was not normal, nor accepted by many. It was the first Genocide on a massive industrial scale. Even the War effort of supplies took second place for material and trains to keep the slaughter going.
 

gerryh

Time Out
Nov 21, 2004
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What's surprising, is that anyone in this day, would defend these types of laws no matter when they happened. It shows how morally bankrupt some have been, and some still are.
 

Goober

Hall of Fame Member
Jan 23, 2009
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What's surprising, is that anyone in this day, would defend these types of laws no matter when they happened. It shows how morally bankrupt some have been, and some still are.

Many mouth Freedom, but only when they like it.
 

JLM

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Nov 27, 2008
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How? By referendum? By voting for the candidate that promises to rescind it? The point is (for obvious reasons) you and I can't just go disobeying laws because WE think they are wrong. I personally thing every law should be revisited every 10 years or so and re evaluated and amended or revoked as necessary or to remain if it's good.
 

damngrumpy

Executive Branch Member
Mar 16, 2005
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Civil Disobedience is part of an open society, Usually even the radicals know where
the boundries are, and they creep right up to the edge. Civil disobedience is breaking
the law, however it the type of law breaking that acts as a release valve; The difference
is in a civil society it demonstrates dissatisfaction and that is the end of it, In more
radical societies it gets out of hand and creates many problems if not deaths.
Repression of a people and attitudes serves the interests of no one and history demonstrates
that. We had governments dominate the free spirit of people in the middle ages and it
ended in witch hunts etc. Now we see it in the Middle East as it plays out again and again.
 

Dexter Sinister

Unspecified Specialist
Oct 1, 2004
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The Holocaust was not normal, nor accepted by many.
Agreed, but the point was that the people who did it thought it was acceptable, and it was certainly legal in their terms, they made the rules about it. Blackleaf's line of argument taken to its logical extreme would prevent anyone from condemning them for it now. I've seen the argument many times in defense of the indefensible, it's one of those arguments that sounds superficially reasonable but doesn't survive closer inspection.
 

Goober

Hall of Fame Member
Jan 23, 2009
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I'm lost here, where is the "freedom"?

To be who you are without being persecuted by laws such as were present once, that caused this mans suicide.
Many love freedom as long as they agree with it. When it comes to those that are not the same, some then have an issue with freedom.
 

gerryh

Time Out
Nov 21, 2004
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To be who you are without being persecuted by laws such as were present once, that caused this mans suicide.
Many love freedom as long as they agree with it. When it comes to those that are not the same, some then have an issue with freedom.


some, some, some. Brainless twats that deserve to be the ones locked up.
 

SLM

The Velvet Hammer
Mar 5, 2011
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How? By referendum? By voting for the candidate that promises to rescind it? The point is (for obvious reasons) you and I can't just go disobeying laws because WE think they are wrong.

By the attitudes of what is acceptable and what is not acceptable in society.

I personally thing every law should be revisited every 10 years or so and re evaluated and amended or revoked as necessary or to remain if it's good.

Eventually an unjust, unfair law will be tested before the courts. That is how it is reevaluated, amended or revoked as necessary or to remain if it's good.