The Father of Computer Science is Still a Criminal

[Subatomic]

Seeing as the thread is already Godwin'd pretty badly, why not throw in another example from Nazi-Germany:

In 1998 and 2002, almost all verdicts made by the Nazi courts "Volksgerichtshof" and the military "Standgerichte" made against, among others, homosexuals, deserters, resistance fighters etc. were summarily declared invalid and all accused/convicted pardoned. Before that, each case had to be re-examined individually, which was often difficult if not impossible due to missing files, the deaths of people involved and general post-war chaos (and the fact that the judical system as a whole was mostly untouched by de-nazification).
It happened much too late, but it declared that what was the law at the time may have been upheld in these verdicts, but the law in and of itself was unjust and the verdicts thus "Unrechtsurteile" (=unjust verdicts).
Sadly, this so far hasn't happened for the verdicts against homosexuals after 1945. The law against homosexuality was, aside from the penalty, carried over into post-war Germany almost unchanged and only (mostly) rescinded in 1973.

 

[Vivi22]

Emphasis is my own.

Early in 1944 a suspicion arose that he might have been the man responsible for molesting schoolboys at the main public library in Luton, a large industrial town not far from Bletchley. While no proceedings arose, it was decided that the need for good order and discipline required his removal - but not before he had done his finest work.

And the bold parts really tell you all you need to know don't they? I'm not sure how anyone couldn't be skeptical of claims that a man, known to be a homosexual at the time, was molesting children.

Why? because homosexuals are more likely to molest children?

I'm thinking you may have misunderstood my post. I'm saying I'm skeptical of any claim made at the time that he was molesting children, particularly since he was never prosecuted, because he was a homosexual. As much as fear and discrimination against homosexuals exists now, it was far worse back then. They were considered immoral, sexual deviants, and I have no trouble believing that if children in the area really were molested that they may have suspected him, not because there was any actual evidence he did it, but because he was gay and a lot of people knew he was gay.

People in general simply had no clue about what homosexuality is and that such people are not horrible monsters out to destroy society and the lives of others. Society considered them evil and that was pretty much that.

 

[Scarim Coral]

Oh what? I thought he was pardon a year ago or so.

Well either way does the pardon matter now? I mean we all know that he was a great man for what he did for his country. It's not like we really need that approval just to be liked.

 

[Daystar Clarion]

It isn't often that people can make me sick to my stomach.

The people who condemn Turing using his machines manage it though.

But yeah, Jobs Innovates, Turing "gets away with".

Filth. The lot of you.

Inb4 something about high horses and the descent thereof


I sort of agree with the decision.

They're not going back and whiting out all the undesirable decisions of the past, but rather, admittting that the law was terrible and ensuring the same thing never happens again.

The same way that we can't start punishing people for things they've done in the past, that happen to be illegal now.

We can't undermine the rule of law. Sure, the law can be pretty damn stupid sometimes, but it's not like we have anything better (I'm sure there's a fallacy in there somewhere).

 

[cobra_ky]

But taking Prime Minster Gordon Brown's word of apology, even though he (The Prime Minister) was only a year old at the time of Turings sentencing, makes him deserving of absolution?

Yeah...

Uh, no, the presumption of innocence does.

And who cares how old Brown was at the time? Were you even alive then?

Exactly.

Why else would they deny this man an absolution of his 'crimes'? They waited till he was done with his work, then charged him a lesser sentence, and even let him choose his punishment. Who else, but a man with with great ideas for their progress, would they let decide his own fate after the fact? Is it sp crazy to think the powers that be can hide things because they want a result?

Yes. Yes, it's pretty crazy to think that the House of Lords today refused to pardon him because they are guarding the secret coverup of the crimes Alan Turing supposedly committed 50 years ago. Never mind that if they actually wanted to cover it up that badly, they simply could have granted the pardon and not lent any credence to your conspiracy theory. I'm sure you could then twist some other event in order to support the conclusion you've already reached.

I have no inside knowledge about what happened, but this just makes more sense than 'The House of Lords are just bitter homophobes'.

Idk, I think that makes an awful lot of sense considering the very law he was convicted under was itself bitterly homophobic.

Then why do they not pardon him, if not for the fact that there may be something they don't want to admit that he was guilty of?

Because they're stuffy jerks who don't want to admit the state was wrong to chemical castrate one of their greatest heroes and drive him to suicide? I think they'd be more likely to cover the ass of their predecessors than a supposed child molester, in which case i remind you that if they actually wanted to cover for him they would have granted the pardon.

Except that doesn't hold up for half a second. "It is tragic that Alan Turing was convicted of an offense which now seems both cruel and absurd".

What part of that quote did you miss? They clearly aren't trying to make themselves out to have been justified in their punishment of this man.

I was perhaps being a bit flippant last evening, because i really don't believe Thal's conspiracy theory is really worht entertaining. But really there's any number of other reasons the House of Lords might have refused a pardon, most notably fear of any potential political or legal repercussions. Male homosexual acts were only decriminalized in 1967, so there are quite possibly men still alive who were convicted of the crime who might start demanding pardons too. Always much safer to do nothing and maintain the status quo.

 

[brazuca]

Such great choices.
Remind me never to work for the British government.

How can you not realize that the reason shit is so fucked up is because people with better/different views refuse to work for government?

This pisses me off almost as much as my American friend who refuses to vote because he doesn't think his vote matters.

Well...

DUH!!!!!!

When half the voting population takes the same shit stance as my friend, it's no wonder things don't change. When you feel your voice is shit, and you don't speak it, You have no right to give a shit. Simple math there... no shit given equals no shit received.


Can I get an Amen...

Can I get someone ta give a shit??

-sigh-

I want to say 'I give up, the dude is a focal point 'for science' (lol) and gay activists, who am I to bring up his possible indiscretions that have caused his refusal to be pardoned...

Let people believe what they want, it makes things easier, eh? (That's how religion still holds people)

What really pisses me off, is that these same people that take no action to vote for anyone to adjust the laws, in the ways they like to scream at the internet as being right when they fear monger just like FOX NEWS! Are they the ones making scandalous headlines on the internets? Are they like you?

Damn cowards...

cYou are sooo right. The main reason why "govs" tend to behave the way they do is because the people who run them are always the same people. AKA the same political stances, classes and ideologies. You can only change something by getting out be heard and become part of the governament.

 

[brazuca]

That would be ilegal. Ex post facto law in mallen parten (latin) as you said is against most countries constitutional rights. I know for fact that this is ilegal in the US. see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ex_post_facto_law

 

[weker]

It was a crime and he was a criminal for doing so, just because it's not a crime doesn't mean we should go back making people not guilty. It's unfair to do so for just one man and ignore everyone else.

 

[Hungry Donner]

"A posthumous pardon was not considered appropriate as Alan Turing was properly convicted of what at the time was a criminal offense."

Unless these matters are quite different in the UK than the US, this is an argument against a posthumous acquittal. A pardon implies that the person did in fact break the law. Unless the British government never grants pardons the fact that Turing was guilty shouldn't be an issue (beyond the fact that it's a prerequisite).

If they had refused because it seemed inappropriate to pardon just one individual convicted of being homosexual I probably would have been OK with that. I generally don't support these sorts of historical reversals. Their comes a time when you admit a law, ruling, or award doesn't fit modern sensibilities; you apologize; and then you try not to repeat the mistake. The second half of the quoted statement sums this up nicely.

However the first half still doesn't sit right with me. I also think Turing is a rare example when an exception is worthwhile. Turing is an opportunity to pardon one individual and have him stand in for everyone who was convicted of homosexuality - thus allowing the government to refute the past criminalization of homosexuality without pardoning everyone.

 

[Treblaine]

They made the right call. No matter his contributions to society he was still guilty of a criminal offence. It does not matter one bit what we think of the laws back then. So it is only right that he stay a criminal.

Oh, so must ALSO think the government was also wrong to posthumously pardon all the soldiers shot for "cowardice" in World War 1? As their cowardice was most definitely a crime.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/1526437/Pardoned-the-306-soldiers-shot-at-dawn-for-cowardice.html

The government is exercising a monumentally hypocritical double-standard. They will forgive soldiers for committing what were factually crimes (that arguably impede the war) yet even the person who contributed so much as a single individual to winning the war, they will not grant a pardon to even him for the utterly victimless crime of being in love with another adult man.

You know what, I think YOU are wrong. I think the House of LORDS are hypocritically wrong and the government was right to pardon soldiers executed for cowardice. By the same principal they should pardon all men convicted of consensually loving other men.

The Lords are also guilty of cowardice, only the most unforgivable king of cowardice, not the terror of a grizzly death but intellectual cowardice to hide behind the EXCUSE of defending standing against "historical revisionism" when it they are happy to give so many other pardons.

NOTHING would say louder that the criminalisation of homosexuality not only existed but WAS WRONG TO OUTLAW than to publicly pardon the crime!

A Pardon is recognising that the law both existed and was WRONG!

 

[Worgen]

Again, people gloss over how he was allegedly a child molester, only given till his work was done, before being given the choice of imprisonment, or chemical castration.

He decided on the chems. He then committed suicide.

If people think that The British House of Lords is some sort of evil homophobic group, so be it... but perhaps what was possibly 'swept under the rug' is why they refuse to pardon the man.

(The Prime Minister who eventually 'apologized' to him was a baby when Alan Turing was convicted. Just sayin.)

Call my crazy but I think your lying since you don't have any sort of citations and I didn't find anything about that from an admittedly simple search.

Wikipedia is a simple search.... perhaps you didn't see that part?

A nonfiction historian (Anthony Cave Brown) wrote about it. I would dare to say he was almost an expert (more than you or I) on the goings on of the WWII era behind the scenes...

But I just think it's a more valid reason for the House of Lords to not pardon him as opposed to they just being evil homophobes.

Savvy?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alan_Turing

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthony_Cave_Brown

All wikipedia says is that "Early in 1944 a suspicion arose that he might have been the man responsible for molesting schoolboys at the main public library in Luton, a large industrial town not far from Bletchley. While no proceedings arose, it was decided that the need for good order and discipline required his removal - but not before he had done his finest work." Considering that he was apparently a known homosexual and homosexuality was very illegal they probably wisely decided to dismiss him since if it became known that a homosexual was working there, things would have gotten bad.

Besides the story they linked here on the forums plainly said they decided not to because at the time homosexuality was illegal and he was convicted of being a homosexual, its a retarded law but he was technically guilty of it.

 

[Negatempest]

Okay. Whether we want to admit it or not, homosexuality was always somehow connected to "molesting boys" in the majority of 1900's though this "fact" is far from true. Though what they "could" charge him for was just being Gay. I don't like it myself, not at all, but I don't live in the country of Britain so I'll keep my opinion to myself.

...Breaking the Law for being a homosexual....LOL!!!!!!! What a sad time that was.

 

[maninahat]

Again, people gloss over how he was allegedly a child molester, only given till his work was done, before being given the choice of imprisonment, or chemical castration.

He decided on the chems. He then committed suicide.

If people think that The British House of Lords is some sort of evil homophobic group, so be it... but perhaps what was possibly 'swept under the rug' is why they refuse to pardon the man.

(The Prime Minister who eventually 'apologized' to him was a baby when Alan Turing was convicted. Just sayin.)

It would be surprising (or it should be, anyway) how many people have ther past filtered out of their legacy. For instance, Lawrence Oates, the Antarctic explorer famous for his self sacrifice ("I'm going outside, I may be some time...") also once got an 11 year old pregnant. Take any influential figure - Ghandi, Churchill, Martin Luther King - and you'll discover plenty of unsavoury stuff about them that often goes unmentioned.

 

[Treblaine]

That would be ilegal. Ex post facto law in mallen parten (latin) as you said is against most countries constitutional rights. I know for fact that this is ilegal in the US. see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ex_post_facto_law

Number one, we don't have a codified constitution. The government could pass a series of laws that decreed every family's first-born son will be taken away and killed, King Herod style. And if the laws pass the vote then you can't cite a single constitutional ruling to stop this.

The UK parliament has Absolute Power.

There is not such thing as an unconstitutional law in the UK.

Number Two, even if this Ex-post-facto law was in place preventing pardons and they couldn't be bothered to amend it, why did it not apply is 2006 when they were able to posthumously pardon all the soldiers they executed for cowardice in the First World War?

Number three, Ex-post-Facto has never been applied to prevent pardons or clemency, only to escalating punishment after a crime, or charging someone for a crime when they committed said act when before said act had been criminalised.

US and UK most definitely have the power to execute pardons, especially posthumously.

 

[The_root_of_all_evil]

We can't undermine the rule of law. Sure, the law can be pretty damn stupid sometimes, but it's not like we have anything better (I'm sure there's a fallacy in there somewhere).

http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/top-stories/2010/09/18/the-pope-apologises-for-catholic-priests-unspeakable-crimes-against-children-115875-22570046/

If the Pope is fallible, the Government have no excuse.

There's a statue to him, and they can't pardon him?

Filth.

 

[cynicalsaint1]

"A posthumous pardon was not considered appropriate as Alan Turing was properly convicted of what at the time was a criminal offense. He would have known that his offense was against the law and that he would be prosecuted."

"It is tragic that Alan Turing was convicted of an offense which now seems both cruel and absurd-particularly poignant given his outstanding contribution to the war effort. However, the law at the time required a prosecution and, as such, long-standing policy has been to accept that such convictions took place and, rather than trying to alter the historical context and to put right what cannot be put right, ensure instead that we never again return to those times."

Utterly ridiculous.
Isn't the whole point of a pardon to absolve someone of a crime they committed?

I mean fuck. Nixon got pardoned for actual crimes he committed that would still be illegal today, but the UK can't give Turing a pardon for the grievous crime of being gay? Being both a software developer and a gamer I can say my life would likely be completely different without his work.

 

[draythefingerless]

touchy situation...regardless, people shouldnt care so much about this. what hapened to Turing happened in a bygone era, the same could be applied to the times of slavery, or ancient egypt. i mean, youre ok with the slavery back then, thats how things were, youre not now charging alexander the great for being a dictator are you?

my love and respect go to Turing. hes one of the greats, and at least the UK government acknowledges him as such. thats enough for me.