Quote ="JerryChicken"Totally meaningless waste of a press release but I expect they needed a "nice" story for Christmas Eve.
All that is needed is a one-size-fits-all definition of context, this would then cover any past legislation, persecution, prejudice and stuff-that-just-sounds-wrong these days.
A realisation that in the context of times past things were done differently, for different reasons is all that is required - society was more racist by comparison with today, it was without doubt homophobic, it relied on the class system and the knowledge that you had "betters" who should be followed without question, we have the luxury of being able to point at that history and state that we should ensure that it never works that way again but to re-write that history as if it never happened is a dangerous path to walk down.
A bit like erasing any evidence of your manifesto prior to the next election so that you don't get held to account for subsequently ignoring it.'"
Exactly. I got the impression that this guy was a tad detatched from reality, undoubtedly a genius in his own chosen field, but even "National Assets" are not above the Law of the Land.
He was judged and convicted by the law as it stood at that time. End of. Are we going to extend an Apology to those convicted of witchcraft way back in the middle ages? The 10 year old boy sentenced to transportation for stealing an apple? A meaningless Pardon to all persons hung, drawn and quartered, simply because we don't do it today?
I have a hell of a lot more sympathy for the soldiers who were hammered for months on end in the trenches, before cracking, and then having to face the final ignominy of a Firing Squad consisting of soldiers from their own regiment.
