Alan Turing pardon

The reason for the pardon isn't the only issue, it's the injustice that gay men faced, so I hope this clumsy but welcome progress has set a precedent for more men to not only be pardoned but have those convictions overturned.

Sometimes I despair of myself, missing all these so important news items.

But When do you think that will happen? It just seems so wrong to pardon someone because they were valuable to society and not just as a human being and it was simply wrong? I wonder if Stonewall are doing something ? JO8 I just devour the Guardian over breakfast ! Sad life!

What would be gained by pardoning him? The law was as it was at the time. How far will we take this sort of thing? It could go on forever! Surely the past is just that?

I've googled it. Very sad. The world was very narrow minded, and cruel, in 1952! Thank God we've come on in leaps and bounds fairly recently.

Not sure a posthumous pardon will help anything though. The history is written now. I guess it would be a belated apology.

Not sad at all bluebell.

I think a general pardon for every man found guilty of simply having a homosexual relationship (I am not talking about other crimes, such as having sex with underage partners) would be extremely welcome by many men and their families. Surely it is never too late to put right a patent wrong?

Moved - you do have a very valid point. There have been a lot of changes in social legislation eg abortion, attempted suicide where people were punished and now wouldn't be because the law has changed. But if the government decides to pardon, I think it should be everyone in that category if pardons are to handed out and not a favoured few ( or one)

I see the floodgates opening for everything that was a crime in the past and no longer is. Loads of time spent in discussing it in parliament, loads of media discussion and not a lot gained. Surely our movers and shakers should be looking to the future?

So Alan Turing is to be pardoned but Oscar Wilde is not, despite being convicted of the same offence. A move for a group pardon was dismissed in parliament Greatnan

Maybe it would be a symbolic act of contrition. Australian government said "sorry" to its indigenous people just a few years ago. The injustice in that case was monumental and the effects still very evident today. In the case of homosexuals the injustice was personal so it does not make much sense to apologise to todays gay community.

Bluebell a few gay men have been able to have their convictions for homosexual acts deleted from the Police record (PNC), as they have been dogged by longstanding Buggery convictions showng up on their CRBs when applying for jobs. The gay rights group GALOP has campaigned for convictions to be overturned, but gets little publicity. It certainly would open the floodgates if all such convictions coud be overturned, but the numbers of men who are alive and affected by still having such convctions aren't that high that it couldn't be done.

If banks can deal with improper PPI and bank charges, the criminal justice system could have a simple system for overturning and deleting convictions on application. There woudn't be an onus of proof via appeal by acknowledging that the law was unjust, particularly as there was no such offence or conviction for women.

Galop's leaflet about CRBs:

www.galop.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/crb-previous-convictions-2010-a4.pdf

I suspect that there is still a good deal of covert homophobia. The speeches on gay marriage were enlightening.

You cannot rewrite the past. Of course the treatment of Alan Turing and other gay people was barbaric when we look at it with 21st century glasses and the understanding and acceptance homosexuality now has, but that applies to almost everything that happened in the past from the burning of witches to sending small boys up chimneys.

Are we to apologise to everyone who has ever lived in Britain no matter how long ago because at sometime in their lives, if not all their lives they were persecuted for something now considered if not laudable, at least perfectly acceptable.

Think, 100 years from now people will be demanding apologies for the appalling way we treated some sector of society now and whatever it is that appals the 22nd century citizen it will not be something we see in our society that appals or just discomforts us. It will be something we do now that is seen as totally right and admirable.

Alan Turing's brilliance, the importance he played in winning the war is all widely accepted and his place in the national pantheon is guaranteed. He is dead and is no more aware of the 21st century apology for mid 20th century moral standards than if the pendulum had swung the other way to be more violently homophobic and we were now digging up his mortal remains and hanging them from a lamp post because he was gay.

These apologies are fatuous.

I was not thinking of the dead, but of living men who were prosecuted and possibly still have the conviction on their record. I don't see why wrongs cannot be put right, if there is the political will. I don't think they would find an apology fatuous, but a pardon would be better.

I was not thinking of the dead, but of living men who were prosecuted and possibly still have the conviction on their record. I don't see why wrongs cannot be put right, if there is the political will. I don't think they would find an apology fatuous, but a pardon would be better.

I completely agree that anyone living with a conviction for something now considered legal should get a pardon, but I still consider apologies fatuous.

I think sometimes posthumous pardons can help the family of those convicted (e.g shooting soldiers in WW1 suffering from what we now call PTS) and also it is a public statement that national attitudes have changed or new evidence has come to light. Obviously not going to help the key person concerned!

What does pardoning actually mean? Does it mean that the person was guilty, but has been forgiven, or does it mean their conviction has been overturned, usually because there is new evidence that has been presented on appeal?
The latter clearly doesn't apply in the case of Alan Turing, and it seems arrogant in the extreme for the State to forgive him for something which is now no longer regarded as a crime.
What really horrified me was learning that he had been sentenced to chemical castration - that only 60 years ago, in my lifetime, this country could have been so barbaric.

Pardon means being forgiven, not that the conviction has been overturned. Some sex offenders still receive chemical libido reduction treatment along with therapy today, Jane

jane - that's exactly what I thought when I read that. It's horrific to think it happened only that short time ago! Thank God the world has come on in leaps and bounds in the fairly recent past.

Sex offenders are completely different.

Jingle Alan Turing WAS treated as a sex offender and was offered the choice of chemical castration or prison. The rationale was to try to turn him 'straight' by reducing his libido.