Alan Turing: not before time

Talk about anything but keep it polite and reasonably clean.
Post Reply
User avatar
djewesbury
Graham’s 1970
Posts: 8165
Joined: 20:01 Mon 31 Dec 2012
Location: Gothenburg, Sweden
Contact:

Alan Turing: not before time

Post by djewesbury »

Am I alone in feeling that the 'pardon' for Alan Turing does nothing to mitigate the wrongs done to him?

EDIT: I ask as I believe there may be a few here who hold him in esteem; hopefully this is not entirely off-topic.
Daniel J.
Husband of a relentless former Soviet Chess Master.
delete.. delete.. *sigh*.. delete...
User avatar
DRT
Fonseca 1966
Posts: 15779
Joined: 23:51 Wed 20 Jun 2007
Location: Chesterfield, UK
Contact:

Re: Alan Turing: not before time

Post by DRT »

As this topic carries various risks I thought it worthwhile to remind everyone of Rule 1!

The Forum Rules wrote:1. Be civil - no flaming, no obscene swearing, no insults, no racism, no sexism, no political fights. Teasing is fine but nothing offensive. Basically be nice. Let's make this the nicest site on the web.

"The first duty of Port is to be red"
Ernest H. Cockburn
User avatar
DRT
Fonseca 1966
Posts: 15779
Joined: 23:51 Wed 20 Jun 2007
Location: Chesterfield, UK
Contact:

Re: Alan Turing: not before time

Post by DRT »

I agree that the pardon does little or nothing to put things back as they should have been but with such a long passage of time it is difficult to imagine anything that could be done that would be meaningful.

On thing that struck me this morning when watching the news was the inequality this action creates. Why should one person be pardoned of that "crime" when many others who didn't happen to crack codes during WWII have received no pardon. Would it not be better to pardon everyone who suffered as a result of that now-repealed law rather than choosing the few who happened to be in the public eye for unconnected reason?
"The first duty of Port is to be red"
Ernest H. Cockburn
User avatar
jdaw1
Cockburn 1851
Posts: 23613
Joined: 15:03 Thu 21 Jun 2007
Location: London
Contact:

Re: Alan Turing: not before time

Post by jdaw1 »

A ‘pardon’ seems to be one of several things.
1. He did it, and it was wrong, but we’ve decided that we love him anyway.
2. He did it, but the law was wrong to make that a criminal offence.
3. It wasn’t him.
4. (US only) He’s made lots of juicy donations to my campaign.

The Wilde/Turing-type pardon is obviously #2.

As to Derek’s point, what’s wrong with there being privileges for those who save the lives of millions of our troops?
User avatar
djewesbury
Graham’s 1970
Posts: 8165
Joined: 20:01 Mon 31 Dec 2012
Location: Gothenburg, Sweden
Contact:

Re: Alan Turing: not before time

Post by djewesbury »

Or, perhaps, apologising for things that were done under laws that have since been repealed serves only to produce some transient gain in the present. Or am I too cynical?
Daniel J.
Husband of a relentless former Soviet Chess Master.
delete.. delete.. *sigh*.. delete...
User avatar
DRT
Fonseca 1966
Posts: 15779
Joined: 23:51 Wed 20 Jun 2007
Location: Chesterfield, UK
Contact:

Re: Alan Turing: not before time

Post by DRT »

jdaw1 wrote:As to Derek’s point, what’s wrong with there being privileges for those who save the lives of millions of our troops?
Nothing, but I don't think a #2 pardon can be considered a privilege. Where #2 pardon situations emerge there should be automatic pardoning of all of those who received injustice. Honouring a man for saving millions of lives is completely separate and would be better achieved by doing something positive rather than undoing something that was wrong.
"The first duty of Port is to be red"
Ernest H. Cockburn
User avatar
jdaw1
Cockburn 1851
Posts: 23613
Joined: 15:03 Thu 21 Jun 2007
Location: London
Contact:

Re: Alan Turing: not before time

Post by jdaw1 »

Undoing the past creates mess and expense.

Mr A is convicted of something, and goes to jail. So his bank refuses him a loan. Mr A dies. The gov’t #2-pardons him. Can his estate then sue the bank?

Undoing the past creates mess and expense. Hence it should be done only a little.
User avatar
djewesbury
Graham’s 1970
Posts: 8165
Joined: 20:01 Mon 31 Dec 2012
Location: Gothenburg, Sweden
Contact:

Re: Alan Turing: not before time

Post by djewesbury »

DRT wrote:
jdaw1 wrote:As to Derek’s point, what’s wrong with there being privileges for those who save the lives of millions of our troops?
Nothing, but I don't think a #2 pardon can be considered a privilege. Where #2 pardon situations emerge there should be automatic pardoning of all of those who received injustice. Honouring a man for saving millions of lives is completely separate and would be better achieved by doing something positive rather than undoing something that was wrong.
I agree. Special treatment is never a good basis for legal action, which this is. Either it applies to all, or to none. Now, however, the campaign for a posthumous honour can begin, to recognise the contribution that JDAW has identified.
Daniel J.
Husband of a relentless former Soviet Chess Master.
delete.. delete.. *sigh*.. delete...
User avatar
djewesbury
Graham’s 1970
Posts: 8165
Joined: 20:01 Mon 31 Dec 2012
Location: Gothenburg, Sweden
Contact:

Re: Alan Turing: not before time

Post by djewesbury »

jdaw1 wrote:Undoing the past creates mess and expense.

Mr A is convicted of something, and goes to jail. So his bank refuses him a loan. Mr A dies. The gov’t #2-pardons him. Can his estate then sue the bank?

Undoing the past creates mess and expense. Hence it should be done only a little.
His estate cannot sue the bank since the bank did not create the law; they acted according to it, and had no choice in the matter. Reparations by government to generations not significantly materially affected by the original wrong are another matter: the morality of these can be debated. (I'm against, for the most part, except maybe where the injustice persists in the ownership of or disentitlement from property.)
Daniel J.
Husband of a relentless former Soviet Chess Master.
delete.. delete.. *sigh*.. delete...
User avatar
DRT
Fonseca 1966
Posts: 15779
Joined: 23:51 Wed 20 Jun 2007
Location: Chesterfield, UK
Contact:

Re: Alan Turing: not before time

Post by DRT »

jdaw1 wrote:Undoing the past creates mess and expense.

Mr A is convicted of something, and goes to jail. So his bank refuses him a loan. Mr A dies. The gov’t #2-pardons him. Can his estate then sue the bank?

Undoing the past creates mess and expense. Hence it should be done only a little.
It is not beyond the wit of man to devise a pardon-like mechanism that does not create the mess. What is required, I think, is some sort of public acknowledgement that those who suffered as a result of a repealed law such as this one were guilty of nothing, thus allowing the record to be put straight for all and privileges to be allowable for the few. If the current laws around what a pardon means cannot do that without opening up the mess then change those laws so that the mess doesn't happen.
"The first duty of Port is to be red"
Ernest H. Cockburn
User avatar
jdaw1
Cockburn 1851
Posts: 23613
Joined: 15:03 Thu 21 Jun 2007
Location: London
Contact:

Re: Alan Turing: not before time

Post by jdaw1 »

djewesbury wrote:His estate cannot sue the bank since the bank did not create the law; they acted according to it, and had no choice in the matter. Reparations by government to generations not significantly materially affected by the original wrong are another matter: the morality of these can be debated. (I'm against, for the most part, except maybe where the injustice persists in the ownership of or disentitlement from property.)
Is the purpose of the pardon symbolic or practical?

If it is to undo as much damage as possible, the estate should be able to sue.

If it is merely symbolic much expense saved, phew! then there is no need to go to the expense and trouble of undoing all the convictions. And it would be a lot of trouble: some of the convictions will have been for offences committed with adults, but not all. Facts would need to be reviewed, and appealed against, for each one. And using the age of consent after repeal (21), or the current age of consent (16)? But that isn’t needed if the purpose of the pardon is symbolic.
User avatar
jdaw1
Cockburn 1851
Posts: 23613
Joined: 15:03 Thu 21 Jun 2007
Location: London
Contact:

Re: Alan Turing: not before time

Post by jdaw1 »

DRT wrote:It is not beyond the wit of man to devise a pardon-like mechanism that does not create the mess.
Not at all. This one chappie is being pardoned. Others, less famous, less heroic, or plain unlucky, are welcome to choose to take comfort from this. The End.
User avatar
DRT
Fonseca 1966
Posts: 15779
Joined: 23:51 Wed 20 Jun 2007
Location: Chesterfield, UK
Contact:

Re: Alan Turing: not before time

Post by DRT »

jdaw1 wrote:
DRT wrote:It is not beyond the wit of man to devise a pardon-like mechanism that does not create the mess.
Not at all. This one chappie is being pardoned. Others, less famous, less heroic, or plain unlucky, are welcome to choose to take comfort from this. The End.
For #1, #3 and #4 type pardons I would agree with you, but for #2 it creates even more unfairness than already existed.

I still don't agree that a #2 should constitute a privilege.
"The first duty of Port is to be red"
Ernest H. Cockburn
User avatar
djewesbury
Graham’s 1970
Posts: 8165
Joined: 20:01 Mon 31 Dec 2012
Location: Gothenburg, Sweden
Contact:

Re: Alan Turing: not before time

Post by djewesbury »

jdaw1 wrote:
DRT wrote:It is not beyond the wit of man to devise a pardon-like mechanism that does not create the mess.
Not at all. This one chappie is being pardoned. Others, less famous, less heroic, or plain unlucky, are welcome to choose to take comfort from this. The End.
So we should allow Turing to stand in, as a sort of gay icon, for all those prosecuted under this law? An interesting proposal: we could call this synecdochic law. Pardon one who will stand for all. "Great-grandfather was a Turing".
How postmodern.
Daniel J.
Husband of a relentless former Soviet Chess Master.
delete.. delete.. *sigh*.. delete...
LGTrotter
Dalva Golden White Colheita 1952
Posts: 3707
Joined: 17:45 Fri 19 Oct 2012
Location: Somerset, UK

Re: Alan Turing: not before time

Post by LGTrotter »

djewesbury wrote:Am I alone in feeling that the 'pardon' for Alan Turing does nothing to mitigate the wrongs done to him?

EDIT: I ask as I believe there may be a few here who hold him in esteem; hopefully this is not entirely off-topic.
You are not alone.
User avatar
jdaw1
Cockburn 1851
Posts: 23613
Joined: 15:03 Thu 21 Jun 2007
Location: London
Contact:

Re: Alan Turing: not before time

Post by jdaw1 »

If the age of consent were later to be raised to eighteen, should those who ‘got off’ including not prosecuted for crimes that weren’t crimes when they were committed (i.e., aged 16 and 17) be posthumously prosecuted? Should they have any posthumous damage to their reputation?

I think that the answer might that a few, particularly worthy of that dishonour, should indeed be subject to it. But not most.
User avatar
jdaw1
Cockburn 1851
Posts: 23613
Joined: 15:03 Thu 21 Jun 2007
Location: London
Contact:

Re: Alan Turing: not before time

Post by jdaw1 »

And let me try again.

The current laws on addictive narcotics are a disaster. If legalisation were terrible, it would be a lot better than the current position. So imagine that, in some years, addictive narcotics are legalised it matters not what form that legalisation takes. Should every convicted cocaine trafficker then receive a pardon and apology from Her Majesty?

I vote no.
User avatar
DRT
Fonseca 1966
Posts: 15779
Joined: 23:51 Wed 20 Jun 2007
Location: Chesterfield, UK
Contact:

Re: Alan Turing: not before time

Post by DRT »

I see where you are coming from and agree with your stance on that subject. However, I think a degree of discretion would need to be applied in each instance where a law is fundamentally changed.

There are some things that were once legal accepted or not accepted that have now changed: genocide, slavery, torture, raping your wife, hanging/imprisoning homosexuals, etc, where our now more enlightened society can clearly see that the acceptance of such things is morally reprehensible and a fundamental infringement of another person or persons human rights. Reversing the wrongs of those things is, I believe, justified so far as is practical to do so.

I do not see taking or selling drugs as being in the same category as any of the above. Drug traffickers knowingly break the law for profit and knowingly destroy people's lives. They do not have a right to do that. In a society which allowed the use of recreational drugs drug traffickers would not exist,the drugs would be sold in the same way as we currently buy basic food and drink.

A slave should never have been a slave.

A woman should never have been raped.

A homosexual should never have been imprisoned for being a homosexual.

A drug trafficker should never have broken the law and destroyed lives.

I think there is a clear distinction here but accept that there is a point at which the two extremes meet which would prove to be tricky.
"The first duty of Port is to be red"
Ernest H. Cockburn
User avatar
jdaw1
Cockburn 1851
Posts: 23613
Joined: 15:03 Thu 21 Jun 2007
Location: London
Contact:

Re: Alan Turing: not before time

Post by jdaw1 »

To what extent should the law tolerate consensual violence, or even consensual murder? (E.g. 1; E.g. 2; E.g. 3.) Once we accept that criminal law shouldn’t interfere with consenting adults, does consensual violence become legal? With pardons and apologies?
DRT wrote:so far as is practical to do so.
So far as is practical on a budget of at least 10% of GDP, or so far as is practical on a budget of about zero?

These pardons need an awareness of the facts. Somebody imprisoned for just one set of acts, because the prosecutor didn’t bother with the charges relating to the 20YO (or 17 or 15 or 9) isn’t the same as an adults-only set of facts. So money is spent reviewing facts. Once some of those convicted are pardoned, then not-being-pardoned is posthumously being accused of under-age offences. Does that need to be proven beyond reasonable doubt? Because the descendants of the non-pardoned will argue that in court. There will be marginal cases, in which missing facts make some amount of under-ageness possible / probable / almost certain. The whole business will be nasty, all over again, not making the world a better place.

Much better is to select an icon because brilliant or separately deserving or both check his facts, pardon him, and be done with it. Nobody is de facto accused by not being pardoned. No other facts to check. Those who wish to take comfort may do so.
Post Reply