Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Mongrel]

Alan Turing has been granted a pardon for liking dudes, nearly 60 years after his death (and more than 60 years after his castration).

I may be a straight man, but I have always maintained that if either Freddie Mercury or Alan Turing had ever propositioned me, there's no way I'd have ever been able to say no.

_{(sorry Freddie, no bareback for you though)}

[Brentai]

It seemed more or less token when I posted it but after considering the circumstances, this is pretty major turn for GB.  3 years ago the official response boiled down to "We may disagree with the laws of the time but they were the laws of the time and Turing broke them."  Now we've got a document straight from Her Freaking Majesty Herself (who may not be an actual lawmaker per se but whose opinions are probably worth more, culturally) saying no, this never should have happened.  So that's the word.

[Thad]

But have they pardoned everybody ELSE convicted of sodomy?

Because Alan Turing is my fucking hero, but there are people who are still alive who were subjected to the same treatment he was.  It'd be a lot easier for me to get excited about a symbolic gesture if it were accompanied by extending the same courtesy to people for whom it might actually still matter.

[Büge]

Dead men don't reject apologies.

[Brentai]

I assume it's coming.  You can't really kowtow to public opinion and then set a precedent that it's only okay if you happen to be a war hero.

[Büge]

Alan Turing has been granted a pardon for liking dudes, nearly 60 years after his death (and more than 60 years after his chemical castration).

Liberal Democrat peer Lord Sharkey, who introduced the private member's bill in the House of Lords, said: "This has demonstrated wisdom and compassion. It has recognised a very great British hero and made some amends for the cruelty and injustice with which Turing was treated.

"It's a wonderful thing, but we are not quite finished yet. I will continue to campaign for all those convicted as Turing was, simply for being gay, to have their convictions disregarded. That will be a proper and fitting and final end to the Turing story."