
Thousands call for Turing apology - jsmcgd
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/8226509.stm
======
vixen99
How do you apologize for something you haven't done? Governments are
constituted by human beings; so who today is complicit in the persecution of
Turing? Answer, no one at all. The past is the past.It happened and there's
nothing we can do to change it. Use of the word apology' in this context by
people not responsible for that action merely degrades the meaning of the
word. By all means express regret that a previous government did such and such
but don't let's call it an apology which is rather cheap if you think about
it.

If this pseudo-apology-for-past-sins-by-dead-people bandwagon gets going,
where's it going to stop? Will we define a year zero prior to which we will
not be apologizing for what we now regard as foul behaviour by the elite who
ran the country at that time? Or do we form national bureaucracies to deal
with the massive inbox of accumulated misdeeds down the ages?

~~~
kentosi
After reading what you wrote South Africa comes to my mind. On the one hand
there are people who think that "black economic empowerment" should stop
because it's causing reverse-discrimination towards young white South-Africans
who were born after apartheid and therefore have nothing to do with it.

On the other hand the reverse argument is that although many young white South
Africans have had nothing to do with apartheid directly, many of them are
indirectly better from it - eg - the suburb/area they're raised in, the
business connections they have, etc.

I don’t have a concrete opinion on this, because I’m not South African.
However, being an Australian, I can see how important the public apology to
the indigenous Australians was.

Before the public apology was given, many (particularly older generation
Australians) disagreed by your line of argument – which is that we shouldn’t
apologise for something done by people in the past.

It’s true that the atrocities committed towards Indigenous Australians are in
the past, but where the Indigenous Australians are now is a result of all that
has happened to them. To these people the apology goes a lot deeper than just
a symbolic gesture. It's a form of closure that begins and allows the healing
process.

~~~
catzaa
> n the one hand there are people who think that "black economic empowerment"
> should stop because it's causing reverse-discrimination towards young white
> South-Africans who were born after apartheid and therefore have nothing to
> do with it.

My views on this is different and sure to be controversial, but here it goes
(you are free to differ with me). Firstly, white people did not benefit from
Apartheid. Taxation (of whites) during Apartheid was higher than taxation
during the Mbeki era (the middle class white people actually got a lot richer
during the Mbeki era).

The Apartheid experiment also cost a lot of money. All the universities (for
both black and white people) were built during the apartheid era. So did the
costs of setting up governments in the homelands. The apartheid government
tried to “kick start” the economies near major black areas – buy for instance
starting industrial zones that are free of value-added tax (a lot of those
factories are empty now).

Now, the new South African government only replaced the white ruling elite
with even smaller black ruling elite. For that small elite life is better in
the new South Africa – but for all the other black people the living standards
fell.

Here are a few good examples: Since 1995 the income inequality greatly
increased – both between black and white and in the black group itself (i.e.
the forming of an elite). The number of people living on less than a dollar a
day increased by more than a million since the end of apartheid. Life
expectancy took a nose dive and unemployment significantly increased
(unemployment is 40%+). The new government did not build a single new
university during the past 15 years. What is worse, they closed all the
teacher and technical colleges. These colleges mainly served black people
(especially in rural areas) and it led to the current severe shortage of
qualified teachers. Violent crime significantly increased. The government was
also not willing to provide anti-retrovirals to HIV positive people for a long
time – which caused probably a million of people to die.

Here is an article that discusses some of the aspects I mentioned:
<http://www.wsws.org/articles/2004/may2004/safr-m21.shtml>

So with all these metrics, you cannot realistically say that the Apartheid
government was worse than the current government. What you can however say was
that the motives for the actions were different.

Now for the apology part. Many white South African’s have apologised
repeatedly for Apartheid and have repeatedly been shamed for it. All of South
Africa’s ills are blamed on Apartheid/white people (a universal scapegoat). If
you are a white person you are expected to be ashamed that you exist and take
all accusations. Affirmative action have become somewhat of a joke. For
example, the biggest municipality in Gauteng put a moratorium on the tendering
of contracts to white owned business.

Affirmative action has become just an excellent excuse to enrich a few
cronies. The biggest benefactors of BEE are black billionaires with ANC
connections (e.g. Patrice Motsepe, Tokyo Sexwale, Sandi Majali, Saki Macazoma)
(This is basically a black oligarchy)

My point (rant?) is that white people are politically and culturally
powerless. The only sustainable solution I see(in which everyone will be
happy) is for white people to leave South Africa (a million already did). Most
young people I know have either short term (1-2 years) or medium term (2-5
year) plans to leave this country. I will go overseas to study early next year
– I doubt that I will return after I finished.

------
edw519
Whether it's Alan Turing, slavery, war crimes, or anything else, the best
apology to someone who is dead would be to stop doing the same things to those
who are living.

~~~
RyanMcGreal
Yes, but an explicit apology forces a benchmark of accountability: if the
government apologized to group A for committing B, why are they still
committing B to group C?

~~~
anamax
"forces"? You clearly don't have much experience with groups of monkeys.

Some of the known-successful ways to get around said "benchmark" are "this
time it's different", "this government is good", "group C deserves it", and
"we're not doing B".

~~~
radu_floricica
Yeah, but it's still much worse if the official climate is that it's
"acceptable". It can always be worse, you know.

~~~
anamax
> Yeah, but it's still much worse if the official climate is that it's
> "acceptable".

How about some supporting evidence?

> It can always be worse, you know.

Yes, it can always be worse, but whether or not a govt has said something is
wrong has no predictive power on that issue.

Every post-1900 by-govt mass murder was committed by a "we don't do those
things" regime.

------
bdfh42
I have the very greatest respect for Alan Turing and his achievements -
fantastic guy and should have got proper recognition for both his war work and
his contributions to maths and the emerging science of computing.

OK - here comes the however. You can't apologise to just one person for the
persecution of homosexuals during that era. What was done to Turing was
disgusting and probably we should be ashamed of it as a nation but it was done
to so many - any apology must be to them all.

~~~
hughprime
_What was done to Turing was disgusting and probably we should be ashamed of
it as a nation but it was done to so many - any apology must be to them all._

Sure, but it was hardly a phenomenon unique to the UK. That kind of treatment
of homosexuals (and indeed, much worse treatments) were sanctioned by every
government on Earth. In addition, just about every religion, club, society,
private business and the vast majority of individuals. And not just in that
era, but from the dawn of time until very recently (and continuing 'til today
in many countries). So any apology needs to be by everybody.

Ah, but why just homosexuals? All sorts of other groups have been treated
unfairly throughout history, often in far more horrible ways than happened to
Alan Turing. And let's not forget all the individuals who were treated poorly
in their lives for reasons that have nothing to do with membership of any
group. So ideally, any apology should be from everybody to everybody --
nothing else would be fair.

Oh, okay, fine. On behalf of the human race, I'd like to apologize for every
bad thing ever done by any now dead member of the human race to any other now
dead member of the human race. Also, on behalf of the human race, I accept
that apology. Can we get on with our lives now?

~~~
petewarden
>That kind of treatment of homosexuals (and indeed, much

>worse treatments) were sanctioned by every government on

>Earth. In addition, just about every religion, club,

>society, private business and the vast majority of

>individuals. And not just in that era, but from the dawn

>of time until very recently

That's a very strange reading of history. There's been massive variations in
the way homosexuality is treated across cultures, just go back to classical
Greece and Rome for some examples. Homophobia isn't a natural instinct, it's
something we learn.

I don't like historical apologies either, but I hate the implication of your
argument against this one. We have to make moral judgments about history, so
we can figure out how to do better. Sure it's hard and uncomfortable, but
anything else is a cop-out.

------
tlrobinson
Led by our very own jgrahamc (<http://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=jgrahamc>)

~~~
a-priori
Here is his blog post with the letter to the Queen.

[http://www.jgc.org/blog/2009/08/letter-to-her-majesty-
queen....](http://www.jgc.org/blog/2009/08/letter-to-her-majesty-queen.html)

~~~
igorhvr
From the blog post:

> "I have the honour to be, Madam, Your Majesty’s humble and obedient
> subject,"

This left a very bad taste in my mouth.

~~~
jgrahamc
I didn't feel that when writing to The Queen asking her to give someone a
knighthood that it would be appropriate for me to use the following language:

"Yo, Liz. No love for AMT? Dude deserves a KCMG. Peace out, John"

~~~
igorhvr
You can be respectful without being subservient.

But assuming RiderOfGiraffes is right about this being nothing more than a
code phrase... well, it is a funny one!

~~~
RiderOfGiraffes
It is a standard form, adhered to for centuries when writing to a British
monarch.

Protocols, especially royal protocols, have evolved to ensure that people know
what is expected of them and can behave in a way so as not to cause
embarrassment or offence. In some ways they really are very similar to
computer protocols. They are there to help people communicate effectively
without distraction. Many computer protocols seems overly verbose, and they
often deal with the potential for things that can no longer happen.

So it is with social protocols. At least with computer protocols and royal
protocols they are pretty explicit. Often when in a social context your really
don't know how you're expected to behave, and hence become anxious, and there
is the potential for huge gaffes.

Again, don't underestimate the cruft that collects over thousands of years.
Most people never have to deal with it.

~~~
LogicHoleFlaw
I have to admit that I like the idea that as an American I could walk up to
President Obama, address him as "Mr. President", and then hold an intelligent
conversation as fellow citizens. That's pretty cool.

~~~
RiderOfGiraffes
I think you'd have trouble getting close enough to do that without first being
vetted in some way.

Similarly, I've been introduced to the Queen (twice), addressed her as "Your
Majesty" followed thereafter as "Ma'am" (to rhyme with "jam", not "arm"), and
held an intelligent conversation. Again, no way that would've happened without
first being vetted.

Random people in the USA don't get simply to walk up to the President, random
people in the UK don't get simply to walk up to the Queen.

~~~
philwelch
If you're lucky, you might catch him on the campaign trail and have a chat
without being vetted. But you can write him a letter without declaring
yourself his loyal and obedient subject.

I'm halfway convinced the only reason anyone still puts up with this shit is
that Elizabeth in particular seems to be pretty cool. Once Prince Chuckles
takes over there might be a considerable uptick in republican sentiments.

~~~
RiderOfGiraffes
Similarly if you catch the Queen on one of her visits to schools, community
centres, _etc.,_ you might very well be able to have a chat without being
vetted.

It's only comparatively recently that letters, especially from a man to a
woman, ceased to be signed "Your obedient servant." To this day business
letters are signed "Yours faithfully". If you write that, do you really mean
it? If you don't write that, you'll be considered an ignorant oik.

> _I'm halfway convinced the only reason anyone still puts up with this shit
> is that Elizabeth in particular seems to be pretty cool._

Maybe, maybe not. It seems that you and most others are unaware that this is
simply one miniscule example in an entire ocean of formal diplomatic and
social protocol. Recently when giving a talk at one of the Livery companies in
London there were similar forms to which one adhered.

In short, I think that the people who are pointing and laughing and saying
it's stupid are those who don't actually know how it works and what it does.
I'm not defending it or saying it's rational, I'm merely saying that looking
in from the outside, you and others are speaking from a position of well-
reasoned ignorance. I grew up in an informal country, similarly thinking that
all this diplomatic protocol crap was an insult and a waste of time.

I was wrong.

Personally, I'm largely convinced that it's an unwillingness even to try to
understand the historical and cultural reasons for this sort of "shit" that
makes so many people in Europe so dismissive of so many Americans. I've lived
in three different cultures and seen this in action. One culture looks at
another not only with incomprehension, but an unwillingness to try to
understand. The Europeans have a multitude of cultures on their doorstep, and
many of them travel, so the situation isn't as bad. In the US there are
cultural differences across the states, but nothing like the differences
across the borders in Europe. As a consequence, it seems, people from the USA
seem much less able to see, understand, and adapt to cultural differences.

Not all, of course, and perhaps not you. But think about it.

Hackers are historically reknowned for not accepting anything on faith, and
thereby ensuring that while they manage to invent things no one else has
thought of, they are equally constantly reinventing the wheel. That's changed
a lot lately, but there is still an air of "If it's not done the way I think
it should, then it's wrong." If you can accept that what someone else does
actually works and has some benefits, even if you wouldn't do it like that,
then you've taken a big step.

This is no longer Hacker News, but cultural differences exist in hacking, and
understanding is always worth striving for.

~~~
philwelch
It seems to me that Britain has quite a bit more of this type of protocol than
the USA, for the simple historical reason that the USA abolished the
aristocracy and established a republic while Britain never did.

The historical and cultural reasons are clear to me: Britain has an unelected,
hereditary monarchy that historically held final authority and had people
killed if they weren't subservient enough. (To be fair, England's experiment
with republicanism was no less tyrannical.) Over time, more and more checks
grew against royal authority until eventually they grew powerless in reality.
There even seem to be a few practical benefits from having the same titular
head of state for decades, since most sources agree that the Queen provides
intelligent and thoughtful advice to her Prime Ministers. It's a role that
most parliamentary republics have replicated, albeit in an elected role.

But there was a time when addressing a monarch by the phrase "I have the
honour to be, Madam, Your Majesty’s humble and obedient subject" _actually
meant what it sounds like_. In practical terms, maybe royal protocol isn't a
real problem. Maybe people tend to create their own royalties and
aristocracies without the presence of a real one. But no, I wouldn't do it
like that, though I understand and appreciate that it seems to work for
Britain.

------
DanielBMarkham
This is one of those things that sound well-meaning, but rubs me the wrong
way.

Each person has to live in the time they are in -- and looking back from each
age to the previous one, we've always thought the old ways were barbaric.

This means that _everybody_ in those ages did things we think are awful:
persecution of gays, slavery, infant selection, serfdom, Jim Crow Laws -- the
list goes on and on and on.

Going back and applying our current morality to 50 years ago is silly. The
people this happened to are dead. The people who did this are either dead or
very, very old. Many thousands or millions more suffered the same fate and
received no such modern recognition. It serves no purpose other that to pat
ourselves on the back at how much more morally superior we are today. And in
fifty more years? Guess what? They'll be feeling the same way about us.

We live in a world where people are still kept as slaves. Where millions
starve. Where governments systematically kill large groups of people who they
don't like. I'm thinking we should take real, live action against current
evils in the world instead of symbolic action against evils we had no part in
and did not observe.

EDIT: I'm going to rant a bit more here, because I think we've grown this
generation of people who think that all of history has to fit inside of their
modern mind, i.e. that history is some kind of morality play made for current
moral standards. It's not. It's a complicated dance of personalities and
forces that has to be observed in it's own way, by it's own lights. To
retroactively expect history to fit into some kind of conception of what you
think it _ought_ to be denies all those people their humanity. </rant>

~~~
nate_meurer
Your thinking seems self-contradictory to me. On the one hand, you seem to
acknowledge the existence of evil in some objective sense, saying that such
evil is rampant in the present time, yet you rule out the use of objective
morality to evaluate our past actions. Do I have that right?

If so, then I think you'll find that you have little in common with most
commenters here. If you reject the premise that Britain's treatment of Turing
was objectively wrong, then the rest of debate will be unfruitful.

~~~
DanielBMarkham
You're asking me about the existence of ultimate truth. That's a little above
my pay grade (although it doesn't stop lots of folks from attempting it!)

I'd rather put it like this: according to the best I know, Turing was treated
unfairly. I do not believe it is moral to treat somebody this way. (Morals, to
me, are inherently personal)

Looking at my own life, I find things that I feel are immoral to me yet I
allow them to happen anyway: modern slavery, the narcotizing of our youth with
technology, or genocide.

When I see things in the past that I find reprehensible or immoral, the
interesting question to me is: how did moral and ethical people at time feel
about this? Why was it allowed? It seems that understanding these people for
who they were -- warts in all -- is to respect them and try to understand
them.

The moment I step back and start applying my values _totally_ to another age,
I stop individualizing the people who lived there. They become puppets or
cartoons for me to lionize or demonize depending on my personal values.

Take Jefferson and slavery. Jefferson is one of my heroes -- he lived very
close to my house, and I admire his thoughts and works. He was the brilliant
author of the DOI, and more importantly, the Virginia Declaration of Human
Rights.

Yet at the same time he allowed slavery -- kept slaves, in fact. There's even
proof that he sired children by his slaves. What to make of that? Was he a
genius? An evil slave-holder?

The truth is that he was _person_ , who lived in his times and did the best he
could. He knew slavery had to go yet couldn't figure out for the life of him
how things would change eventually. He once compared slavery to holding a
rabid wolf by the ears: you don't dare hold on to him, but you don't dare let
him go, either.

Looking at these conflicts in people is how we identify and learn from what
happened. It gives history depth, and it give us a little humility.

Looking back through history, and applying just a little bit of that humility,
it seems totally obvious to me that a hundred years from now people are going
to be doing the same to our generation. And I don't like it. The things I've
done that are immoral I did for what I thought to be good reasons, likewise
these folks with Turing. The people of this age, both good and bad, deserve
our respect because _that's the way we want to be treated by future
generations_.

It's not a matter of being right or wrong. It's a matter of all of us being
_human_ , and respecting each other for it.

~~~
nate_meurer
So are you the kind of person who says we shouldn't try to apply objective
moral/ethical standards to other cultures in the present age? I submit that
there's a much greater cultural distance from modern England to modern Pashtun
Afghanistan than to England of fifty years ago. Would you say that we should
withhold judgement when an Afghan woman is beaten or murdered for leaving her
house alone?

You say that Jefferson was "doing his best". I think you chose Jefferson to
make such a statement as easy as possible for yourself. I don't believe that
the people most responsible for Turing's fate were "doing their best". I think
they knew they were doing something wrong. I think that the Taliban know that
blowing up girls' schools (and the girls) is wrong.

This is why I say you lack a common moral foundation with supporter of an
official apology to Turing. I say that it's wrong, always and everywhere, for
a man to be hounded to suicide for his sexual orientation. If we can't have
any kind of objective foundation, what hope do we have of stopping this from
happening in the future? (that's largely a rhetorical question; I'm well aware
that there have been two millennia of debate over absolute ethics, but for me
this issue is clear as day).

EDIT: Grammar-- damn this vanity.

~~~
randallsquared
_I think that the Taliban know that blowing up girls' schools (and the girls)
is wrong._

I would totally disagree with this. Unfortunately, I think that this
assumption that those who are against us "really" believe as we do and are
deliberately acting in a way they know is wrong is terribly corrosive to
finding solutions; it implies both that we need not sincerely explain
ourselves to "the bad guys", and simultaneously, that they can be convinced to
stop doing bad things if we shine a light on the things they're doing, since
it's assumed that they're really feeling guilty and don't believe the things
they say.

You cannot shame a person into behaving properly if they believe they are
already behaving properly.

~~~
nm2
What? Are you kidding me? This may be something that we won't agree on, but I
chose that extreme example for a reason. Can you honestly say, with a straight
face, that you believe these people think that killing innocent schoolgirls is
_good_? And I'm not talking about the ends-justify-the-means kind of good, but
rather objective _good_.. Do you really think that? If so, then what exactly
what are we supposed to "explain" to them, and why would you imagine that they
can be reckoned with at all? Wouldn't that make them, sort of, oh I don't
know... totally frickin' evil to the core? How does it benefit us to assume
that about our enemies?

Besides, the evidence is against you here. When the Taliban announced last
month that are now devoting themselves to protecting civilians, I can't
imagine that their embrace of the PR value is completely detached from
reality.

BTW - This is still nate_meurer... I can't login from my home for some reason,
thus the new account.

Also BTW - Yes, I am equating the folks who hounded Turing to this death with
the Taliban.

~~~
michaelkeenan
Nate, I recommend to you the work of moral psychologist Jonathan Haidt. This
is his TED talk:
[http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/jonathan_haidt_on_the_mor...](http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/jonathan_haidt_on_the_moral_mind.html)

This is an essay that describes his research on morality:
<http://www.edge.org/3rd_culture/haidt07/haidt07_index.html>

I strongly recommend it! It changed my understanding of what morality is and
what moral beliefs to expect in others, and deepened my understanding of my
own moral intuitions.

The key insight that is relevant here is that educated Westerners (like me
and, presumably, you) see morality as mostly about harm and fairness. But that
view of morality is not so popular outside the West. When we see people doing
harm to innocent girls we find it hard to believe that they think they're
doing good. But other cultures are relatively more concerned with morality
relating to authority/obedience, in-group/out-group treatment, and
purity/disgust.

When people persecute homosexuals or let improperly-dressed girls burn[1]
they're acting based on the purity/disgust aspect of morality, and probably
authority/obedience too. I expect they also usually feel conflicted about it,
because burning schoolgirls must register on the harm-based morality meter. I
think the way to engage with fundamentalists who do this kind of thing is to
emphasize the harm done, and try to undermine the concept of purity-based
morality.

(Westerners also have some reckoning to do with disgust-based morality. It is
hard to argue against infertile adult consensual incest using the morality of
harm and fairness, but many Westerners still regard it as immoral, and find it
hard to explain their moral intuitions. Similarly, Bush Administration-
appointed bioethicist Leon Kass coined the term "the wisdom of repugnance"[2],
using the argument against genetic engineering. I wish humans would abandon
repugnance as relevant to morality.)

[1] Are we talking about this incident?
<http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/1874471.stm>

[2] <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wisdom_of_repugnance>

~~~
randallsquared
Research on morality can tell you a lot about what morals people have, but it
can't tell you anything about what morals people ought to have.

I think that repugnance and disgust exist precisely because they are pretty
good heuristics for things humans thrived by avoiding in general (like your
example of incest), and continuing to thrive may depend on allowing your
disgust to influence what you do even when you can't articulate a rational
reason for it.

~~~
michaelkeenan
>Research on morality can tell you a lot about what morals people have, but it
can't tell you anything about what morals people ought to have.

Yes, I recommended Haidt because the topic was whether the fundamentalists
were acting according to their understanding of morality. If you're saying
that research on morality doesn't yield conclusions on something like "real
true morality", then I agree. But I'd add that Haidt's research helped me see
inconsistencies in my morality, and in this way it's affected my view of the
morality I ought to have.

I agree that repugnance can be a good heuristic for personal actions. I wish
that people wouldn't impose their sense of repugnance on others, though. You
know how Jews aren't allowed to mix dairy products and meat? I thought that
was just an arbitrary rule until I went to Israel and talked to some Jews.
They didn't just find it immoral because the Torah said so; they found the
idea of a cheeseburger or a meat-topped pizza disgusting, as we might find the
idea of meat ice cream disgusting. So I'm concerned that repugnance can easily
get attached to arbitrary things.

More abstractly, we can view repugnance as nature's buggy hack to get us to
avoid harmful things, dating from before we were as intelligent and
knowledgeable as we are now. Purity-morality is just harm-morality implemented
on an obsolete system. Now that we're intelligent enough to judge harm more
competently than instinct (i.e. we get fewer false positives), we can and
should override that judgment, when it helps us. (Trivial but real example
from real life: I used to find mushrooms disgusting, just because. After Haidt
got me thinking about the usefulness of repugnance, I looked up the
nutritional value of mushrooms, found that mushroom-phobia was unhelpful, and
decided to get over it.)

Hubris!

------
revorad
Signed. Bravo jgc.

You can sign it too: <http://petitions.number10.gov.uk/turing/>

~~~
lucumo
Only UK citizens, expats, etc. Foreigners can't sign it.

~~~
hughprime
What about Australians and other Commonwealth citizens who are nonetheless the
Queen's subjects?

~~~
gdp
It's a petition to the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, so Commonwealth
status is unlikely to have any meaning, because he has nothing to do with the
Commonwealth (except for happening to be the leader of a member country).

However, writing to the Queen in support of the knighthood would be within
your rights as a citizen of a Commonwealth country, I should think.

------
araneae
Maybe it's a little bit silly, but I do think a posthumous knighthood is in
order. After all, he did crack the Enigma single-handedly (ok, with a lot of
help), doing more for the Allied forces than probably any other individual.
And Britain repays him by forcing him to take estrogen for a year because he
had sex with some guy who robbed him? Clearly he deserves it more than anyone
else.

~~~
philwelch
Actually, a Polish mathematician named Marian Rejewski had the best claim of
breaking Enigma "single-handedly".

------
mynameishere
I hope I don't die and wind up a political tool.

~~~
jgrahamc
You think I am using Alan Turing for some political end?

~~~
jgrahamc
x[http://www.example.com/\\\>%20&amp;<](http://www.example.com/\\\\>%20&amp;<)?

------
wakeboarder3780
Yeah I heard his name growing up learning CS, I had no idea the troubles he
endured. A tragedy to be sure. As for all the comments regarding apologies to
groups of people being impossible, I'm fairly certain I've heard some before.
A certain Michal Richards comes to mind for dropping some prejudice remarks.
I'm pretty sure he made a prompt apology. Just my $.02

------
jacquesm
Heise.de picked it up on the 18th:

[http://www.heise.de/newsticker/Petition-verlangt-
Entschuldig...](http://www.heise.de/newsticker/Petition-verlangt-
Entschuldigung-fuer-die-Verfolgung-Alan-Turings--/meldung/143664)

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monkeygrinder
The best way to apologise would be to commemorate his work. But the government
has also rejected a petition to fund Bletchley Park.

<http://www.number10.gov.uk/Page20409>

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cabalamat
While it was wrong that Turing was persecuted, this feels to me a bit like
trying to re-write history.

The same goes for British soldiers in WW1 who were executed for cowardice and
recently pardoned.

~~~
jacquesm
Nonsense. These issues are to be tackled one by one.

What was done to Alan Turing and other homosexuals in that period was
absolutely despicable and apology, even though much too late is a way of
recognizing this.

For an encore, there is plenty of stuff done _TODAY_ to homosexuals all over
the world that we would do well to recognize and to act upon.

There are only _people_ , any attempt at discriminating some subgroup is
wrong.

Nobody is trying to rewrite history here, it is rare that governments will
admit to errors and it takes persistence by individuals living today to
'educate' the governments of their responsibilities. Let's hope that actions
like this will make people think twice before doing stupid stuff today.

People living in future times are the ultimate judges.

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seshagiric
Unfortunately as a society we still have discrimination. Either it is against
one's sexual preferences or race or color - we still have a lot of ground to
cover.

