Okay, okay. I agree that Brown has shown some humanity here, and good for him.

And for some reason that's increased my urge to make a pilgrimage to Bletchley Park.

Which acronym dominates?

As for it spreading to the ethical backwater of the United States—from your lips to the gods' ears.

I was going to be all, "There's this cool alternate history novel that touches on being gay in WWII Britain, have you heard of Jo Walton?" And then I realized what website I was on.

It's a step forward. A very necessary step, and overdue, but good on him for taking it.

I do still think, however, that now Mr.Brown will get more and more calls to also apologise on behalf of umpteen other gay personalities of the past, and the thing might get messy. The Tories are silent on these topics, and it will be interesting to see what they do once in power.

That's what matters.

If the govt had granted Turing a posthumous honour, and in so doing had also chosen to make a point about the bigotry of past eras, without the 'proud to be sorry' nonsense, that would have meant more, I think.

What I think he is basically saying is "Our country did some very bad things at the time. We have now stopped treating people this way, and I am proud that we as a country have now advanced to the point where it is possible to officially say that we are sorry for what we did to Alan Turing."

There have been very few cases where a recipient of an honour has died between confirming their acceptance, and the publication of the list. In such cases, I believe the honour is backdated to the date of acceptance. To the untrained eye, this can sometimes look like a posthumous honour, but it's not.

(The exception to this is the case of awards for gallantry - the Victoria Cross, in particular, has been awarded posthumously on a number of occasions, not least because the level of bravery and unswerving self-sacrifice required tends not to be conducive to prolonged survival. This is because such medals are awards for specific acts rather than representing a rank within an order.)

I'm pleased about the Turing apology, though. I was a little unsure about the use of the word "proud", but I think it should be read in the context of "I'm proud that we don't do this sort of thing now" rather than "Hey, everybody, look at how magnanimous I am! Please vote for me!"

Well and good to be pleased that we live in a more enlightened time. But you are still humbled by this opportunity to apologise and express the gratitude of the free world.

Good DAY, sir.

I SAID GOOD DAY, SIR.

Also, I still have difficulty with politicians – especially politicians – apologising for anything that happened in the distant past.  When Turing was convicted of what was then called ‘gross indecency’, Brown was one year old.  How can he, or anybody, meaningfully apologise for something that they didn’t do, in a long-ago time when mores were different?  I think somebody even apologised for the crusades!  Maybe the Brits should apologise for the American Revolutionary War, too.

And, and, and...  why apologise to Turing only, not the thousands of others who were convicted under the same law?  Turing was an eminent victim, yes – so he deserves honour for his eminence, but surely not a unique apology for an aspect of his life in which he was no different from many others?

Now that makes me proud. The modern computer industry is a pretty progressive place, and I'm happy to be part of it.

I signed the petition, as a British citizen. In terms of the sincerity of the PM's response, I don't much care; what I care about is that the government responded to the demands of its citizens and made a clear statement taking a progressive view. What happens inside Mr Brown's head is his own business; what he does as the leader of the British government is what matters.

Heck, the Church eventually apologize for its handling of Galileo.

Individuals aren't the relevant social grouping here--society as a whole is. Brown isn't personally responsible for what happened to Turing but he isn't acting as Gordon Brown, private citizen here; he's acting as Prime Minister of the UK. It's not his apology that's relevant and indeed, had he made it at his own whim it would have been that much weaker for it. But it was demanded by the people of Britain, who are the heirs of the post-War Britain just as we are all the heirs of our earlier selves. That Britain, as a nation, has grown to the point of making this apology is the point, just as if a convicted criminal were to apologize for the actions of her younger self.

It's the same logic behind the Catholic Church apologizing to Darwin and to Galileo.

(Incidentally, that might explain the proudness/humble thing: Brown is personally proud that a penitent Britain is making this apology.)

I've been clicking around 10 Downing Street's E-Petitions site. There are petitions on there requesting the creation of new holidays, letting the Red Arrows overfly the Olympics, not charging the RNLI for the use of radio frequencies, even the kinds of phone lines local health authorities should use. The Turing petition got over 30,000 signatures, but the one calling for Brown's resignation is over 70,000.

He didn't have to do this. He could have ducked it; plenty of observers said he would.

And he could have issued a pardon without saying this:

It is difficult to believe that in living memory, people could become so consumed by hate—by anti-Semitism, by homophobia, by xenophobia and other murderous prejudices—that the gas chambers and crematoria became a piece of the European landscape

I mean, he put his special head-of-state Godwin-proof suit on and classed homophobes with Nazis. That's gotta count for something.

Of course the only way to find out the truth might be to interrogate Brown and his minions using the proper methods.

My bad. He's head of the government. The head of state is someone else, and I doubt I want to know what she—much less her husband—thinks of gays.

Well, crud; doesn't the UK have an equivalent to the Presidential Medal of Freedom, then?

That would be pretty creepy: 'we deeply apologise for the fact we are about to hound you to death'.

So wait, which Royal/British honor is that?

"LGBT" is "Tribune of the Legion of Great Britain". Slightly archaic, now, of course, because the Kingdom of Great Britain technically ceased to exist in 1801, but the name's been kept unchanged because of Tradition.

(And it goes without saying that you should try to avoid confusing it with the GLBT, which I gather is some kind of sandwich.)

(Is it actually true that the Catholic Church apologized to Darwin? I don't see why they would. I've never heard that they did anything particularly bad to him.)

Briefly, the Sexual Offences Act 1967 contained various elements which the courts promptly interpreted in rather homophobic ways. And there was a different age of consent. The Labour Governments of Tony Blair, in which Gordon Brown was Chancellor of the Exchequer, removed those constraints, made it lawful for gays to openly serve in the UK military, introduced Civil Partnerships (marriage in a form which sidesteps religious issues--we still have an Established Church), and so made a huge difference.

So, yes, he can say these things, and feel proud that the world has changed, because he was part of changing it. But there are other stupidities, especially since he took over from Tony Blair, and I wonder how much he, personally, really did.

Abi @40: hard to say what the Queen's attitude to homosexuality is likely to be. Her grandfather, famously, said, "I thought men like that shot themselves", her uncle had a string of affairs with both men and women throughout the 30s (or, as Simon Callow put it, "The Duke of Kent seems to have spent the decade permanently horizontal") and her mother is reputed to have yelled down the stairs to the servants' quarters, "Can't one of you old queens down there mix a drink for this old queen up here?".

Guthrie @39: if you don't see someone's possession of a PhD in 20th century history as relevant to the question of whether or not to bet money on that person being more ignorant of 20th century history than the general British public then I agree; the argument is pointless.

I think there was an episode of Star Trek: Voyager where B'Elanna Torres, the ship's very cranky engineer, was referred to as BLT, and that it didn't go over well.

Regarding apologies for historical mis-deeds, last year the Australian government apologised for the "stolen generations" (the forced removal of aboriginal children from their parents). It made many people very happy. See the above URL for the full text.

In both the UK apology and the Australian apology last year there were people who witnessed the events in question who are still living (I think we should consider Gordon's apology to apply to all gay people who were mistreated).

As for the crusades, it's been a long time since any of the witnesses were alive. But if international relations can be smoothed by an apology for an invasion 900 years ago then it might be worth considering, although given the wide variety of wars during the last 900 years there would probably need to be many apologies from all countries. We could however deprecate the use of the word "crusade" as a positive thing which makes some people from the middle-east rather angry.

Finally the Godwin rule does not apply when there is a legitimate historical comparison. The NAZIs persecuted homosexuals and so did the UK. Admittedly the manner of Alan Turing's death was not as immediate or direct, but I think that a reasonable person could have predicted that outcome given what was done to him.

The others in the group - the usual assortment of geeks, families and tourists - were very respectful of the story.

We might not be all the way there yet, but we live at a time when ordinary people - including older people, families, geeks and prime ministers - can look at prior injustices and see that our own parents and grandparents were wrong. It does give you hope for the future.

The Canadian government also apologised for removing children from their families last year. What I hadn't realized was that the Anglican Church in Canada apologised fifteen years ago for their part in it.

Heresiarch@35:

Yes, the relevant unit is society, but I think there's also the limitation that people need to feel that they are part of the same society that committed the offense. That's why the Catholic Church is the only group that goes around apologizing for actions it took centuries ago. About the time that Pope Urban VIII was harassing Galileo in Italy, King Charles I was expanding the powers of the Star Chamber and enforcing the Anglican liturgy and prayer book on the Scottish Kirk. It would look ridiculous for Gordon Brown to apologise for those actions of the British goverment, in a way that the Vatican apology to Galileo didn't look ridiculous.

"Approved" isn't precisely the right term. "Not blocked" is more accurate.

The clarification that what happened was clearly, utterly wrong was what I took away from the apology and it made me very happy.

but i should think that the work which is of the greatest significance in the long arc of history is his more general work on the theory of computability.

the enigma work was a really cool fix for a tough practical problem.

the work on algorithms, computability, and general turing machines was a glimpse into totally uncharted territory.

a beautiful mind brought low by bigotry. rest in peace.

I love my representative.

The gifts of those who went before us are now ours by inheritance. But just as we receive the gifts so also do we carry the burdens of the mistakes made in our past. First Nations have a profound sense of their continuity with those who have gone before. The traditions of Israel and of the Christian church are built on the notion of a communion of saints and sinners, past and present. If we are to claim “our” history at all, we must claim it all.

and

The church of the past entered willingly and often with good intentions into a relationship with government that seriously harmed our relationship with First Nations communities. We live with that legacy and are called to repair the damage. The church of the present is invited to repent of this past and to build new relationships with First Nations on a foundation of justice and respect.

In other words:
Well Done, Mr. Brown. That's a good start.

http://www.gopetition.com/petitions/dr-alan-m-turing.html

http://www.gopetition.com/petitions/dr-alan-m-turing.html