I dunno. Bill Cosby was a pretty famous guy, who suffered a pretty severe loss of status, but when he got out of jail, I don't think there was any obligation of the state to prevent him from being hounded for the specific purpose of protecting his mental health.
Harassment is a crime, whether or not the person being harassed is a convicted criminal.
Well, if people are doing X, Y, or Z to Bill Cosby, and X, Y, and Z are illegal, then the police should deal with it. But any propensity to suicide on Cosby's part shouldn't be a determining factor in whether the police get involved.
In the UK we don’t have the death penalty for a reason, therefore as a matter of principle, we should not be hounding people to their deaths. In the past, it has usually been considered a serious failing to allow that to happen.
In the UK we don’t have the death penalty for a reason, therefore as a matter of principle, we should not be hounding people to their deaths. In the past, it has usually been considered a serious failing to allow that to happen.
So, if eg. Andrew now tries to make a career on the lecture circuit, and a group of people go around to all his venues and hold up signs on the public sidewalk denouncing him in language that would otherwise be legal, police in the UK would be able to stop the protests if they get a call from Andrew's psychiatrist saying they're making him suicidal?
No, I was talking about our behaviour as a society - by extension what I meant by basic duty of care.
Functionally, if police see anyone in a public space who they believe to be acutely mentally unwell to the point of being a risk to themself or others they can detain them under section 136 of the mental health act, and take them to a place of safety for a medical assessment. This is the power by which police detain people attempting to jump off bridges etc. Likewise, you can be detained against your will for mental health treatment if you are considered to be a risk to yourself or others as a result of a treatable mental illness.
If someone in that state is not treated, and then dies by suicide, it would be considered a failing of public services. It is in those kind of services that coroners do things like issue a prevention of future deaths notice.
No, I was talking about our behaviour as a society - by extension what I meant by basic duty of care.
Functionally, if police see anyone in a public space who they believe to be acutely mentally unwell to the point of being a risk to themself or others they can detain them under section 136 of the mental health act, and take them to a place of safety for a medical assessment. This is the power by which police detain people attempting to jump off bridges etc. Likewise, you can be detained against your will for mental health treatment if you are considered to be a risk to yourself or others as a result of a treatable mental illness.
If someone in that state is not treated, and then dies by suicide, it would be considered a failing of public services.
Oh, okay. You were using the legal protocol around suicide in order to extrapolate how people should personally govern themselves with regards to those vulnerable to suicide.
IOW...
Since the police would intervene to stop Andrew Mountbatten Windsor if he was standing on a bridge threatening to jump, it makes moral sense that you, as an individual, should voluntarily avoid speech or actions toward Andrew Mountbatten Windsor that would encourage him toward suicide in the first place.
That said, if I were to get into the habit of publically lambasting someone with the personal record of Mountbatten Windsor, I'm not sure I would think myself obligated to stop just because I heard it was making him suicidal, even as I might acknowledge an obligation of the authorities to intervene to protect him from himself in the event that he actually does try to commit suicide.
No, I was suggesting that it makes sense for a member of his family - ie the king - to have regard to his welfare even in the process of implementing consequences for his alleged behaviour.
No, I was suggesting that it makes sense for a member of his family - ie the king - to have regard to his welfare even in the process of implementing consequences for his alleged behaviour.
Thanks for further clarifying. BUT...
Does "having regard for his welfare" just mean...
...going the extra mile to ensure the deterrence of activities already classified as criminal, eg. granting Mountbatten Windsor a voucher to hire private security to stop haters from trespassing onto and vandalizing his property, OR...
...would it also include prohibiting certain activities which, while normally considered okay, have been designated criminal specifically when carried out against Mountbatten Windsor, eg. my earlier hypothetical of declaring no-protest bubbles around his speaking venues?
I think this was published just before AMW was stripped of his titles, hence the reference to Prince Andrew.
I have to admit this has a bad smell to it… an organization with an obvious political agenda seeking to bring a private prosecution without any sign of an actual complainant.
I think this was published just before AMW was stripped of his titles, hence the reference to Prince Andrew.
I have to admit this has a bad smell to it… an organization with an obvious political agenda seeking to bring a private prosecution without any sign of an actual complainant.
Whenever I hear the phrase "private prosecution", I assume it's gonna be based on evidence somewhere in the vicinity of the 1970s TV show In Search Of....
(Granted, the only cases that come to mind are, in order of my hearing about them, are: some animal-rights militants in Canada prosrcuting some lab scientists in the 1980s, and Mary Whitehouse vs Gay Jesus in the 1970s.)
I think this was published just before AMW was stripped of his titles, hence the reference to Prince Andrew.
I have to admit this has a bad smell to it… an organization with an obvious political agenda seeking to bring a private prosecution without any sign of an actual complainant.
An interesting aspect to this I was thinking about in bed.
The King has essentially ostracised his own brother. In previous centuries this would be locking him into the tower.
Ok yes there's some cash attached to the arrangement, but then it sounds like there is no royal security and maybe minimal staff. Which sounds ridiculous to ordinary working people, but maybe the truth is that Andrew will be paying for his own effective imprisonment.
We don't know what he has been told, but it might not be a stretch to imagine that the King has put restrictions on Andrews activities. Maybe he's not welcome in London. Maybe he's not expected to hobnob with the set he is use to being in.
Maybe, in fact, he's not expected to leave the Sandringham estate.
Of course the alternative is that the King has given Andrew a rundown cottage in a remote royal estate with the understanding that he will never accept that life and instead will jet off to Bangkok, Brunei or Dubai and become someone else's problem.
I rather like the idea that Charles has discovered he still has some levers to punish wayward relatives with his own form of imprisonment.
I rather like the idea that Charles has discovered he still has some levers to punish wayward relatives with his own form of imprisonment.
It does rather sound like he is being placed under "house arrest".
As to him jetting off to Dubai or Bahrain or some otherwhere to become somebody else's problem, he will always share the royal family's blood and name. He will always be a "family problem".
Also - he knows what he knows and can name other names. I wonder if he will ever be tried in a constitutional court.
Regardless of whatever our intentions or internal motivations might be, we're all still responsible for (and judged according to) our actions, and the kind of cheap grace @Marvin the Martian describes is one of the big factors enabling elite impunity. One of the most appalling thing about Jeffrey Epstein's* infamous "birthday book" is the way it indicates that a lot of Epstein's wealthy friends knew that he was sex trafficking minors and their reaction isn't one of horror or judgment but something along the lines of "there goes Jeffrey again, with his amusing sex trafficking". They essentially put @Marvin the Martian's principle into action, regarding Epstein not as a sex trafficker but rather as a good person who sometimes sexually trafficked underage girls. None of them thought that Epstein "doing something morally repugnant [ made him ] a morally repugnant person" and, more importantly, none of them seem to have done anything like reporting this to the authorities.
That's not "my principle" - nothing I've said means one shouldn't condemn evil or report/prosecute crimes, and indeed truly loving someone can mean helping them to repent of the evil they've done and make restitution to those affected (which may include a lengthy prison sentence where appropriate). I just don't agree that people are forever defined as people by the worst things they've ever done. A person is who they are on their worst day, true, but they are also who they are on every other day of their life. The bad and the good coexist within us all - to greater and lesser extents, yes, but never to the extent that one completely obliterates the other.
Do we not believe in a God who forgives sins? Do we not follow Christ, who refused to condemn even those who nailed him to the cross, instead praying for them to be forgiven? Did He not say "Do not judge, or you too will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you."? How can we believe that and yet pronounce eternal condemnation on others? How can we proclaim that Christ died for us without understanding that He also died for Jeffrey Epstein, Andrew Mountbatten Windsor, and yes even Adolf Hitler. Should that understanding not influence our own attitude towards those people?
Be very careful when refusing cheap grace for others, lest you find the price of grace for yourself to be too expensive.
I think this was published just before AMW was stripped of his titles, hence the reference to Prince Andrew.
I have to admit this has a bad smell to it… an organization with an obvious political agenda seeking to bring a private prosecution without any sign of an actual complainant.
The problem is that their press release gives the impression they intend to prosecute him for something but they don’t yet know for what and on what basis. Which is pretty much the opposite of ethical prosecution practice.
Regardless of whatever our intentions or internal motivations might be, we're all still responsible for (and judged according to) our actions, and the kind of cheap grace @Marvin the Martian describes is one of the big factors enabling elite impunity. One of the most appalling thing about Jeffrey Epstein's* infamous "birthday book" is the way it indicates that a lot of Epstein's wealthy friends knew that he was sex trafficking minors and their reaction isn't one of horror or judgment but something along the lines of "there goes Jeffrey again, with his amusing sex trafficking". They essentially put @Marvin the Martian's principle into action, regarding Epstein not as a sex trafficker but rather as a good person who sometimes sexually trafficked underage girls. None of them thought that Epstein "doing something morally repugnant [ made him ] a morally repugnant person" and, more importantly, none of them seem to have done anything like reporting this to the authorities.
That's not "my principle" - nothing I've said means one shouldn't condemn evil or report/prosecute crimes, and indeed truly loving someone can mean helping them to repent of the evil they've done and make restitution to those affected (which may include a lengthy prison sentence where appropriate). I just don't agree that people are forever defined as people by the worst things they've ever done. A person is who they are on their worst day, true, but they are also who they are on every other day of their life. The bad and the good coexist within us all - to greater and lesser extents, yes, but never to the extent that one completely obliterates the other.
Do we not believe in a God who forgives sins? Do we not follow Christ, who refused to condemn even those who nailed him to the cross, instead praying for them to be forgiven? Did He not say "Do not judge, or you too will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you."? How can we believe that and yet pronounce eternal condemnation on others? How can we proclaim that Christ died for us without understanding that He also died for Jeffrey Epstein, Andrew Mountbatten Windsor, and yes even Adolf Hitler. Should that understanding not influence our own attitude towards those people?
Be very careful when refusing cheap grace for others, lest you find the price of grace for yourself to be too expensive.
This is very true, thank you.
Will you understand me if I point out that there's still a difference between the repentant and the unrepentant, and therefore it's necessary to handle the second kind very carefully to prevent them carrying on with their evils? Not saying to them "this is all you can ever be," but rather saying "for your own sake and the sake of others, until we see clear evidence of a change in you, the following restrictions will apply". There are folks I wouldn't invite into my home, not because I loathe them morally but because there are vulnerable young people there who might be at risk. I don't think Christ expects us to pitch common sense out the door--just judgmentalism and pride.
That's not "my principle" - nothing I've said means one shouldn't condemn evil or report/prosecute crimes, and indeed truly loving someone can mean helping them to repent of the evil they've done and make restitution to those affected (which may include a lengthy prison sentence where appropriate). I just don't agree that people are forever defined as people by the worst things they've ever done. A person is who they are on their worst day, true, but they are also who they are on every other day of their life. The bad and the good coexist within us all - to greater and lesser extents, yes, but never to the extent that one completely obliterates the other.
Do we not believe in a God who forgives sins? Do we not follow Christ, who refused to condemn even those who nailed him to the cross, instead praying for them to be forgiven? Did He not say "Do not judge, or you too will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you."? How can we believe that and yet pronounce eternal condemnation on others? How can we proclaim that Christ died for us without understanding that He also died for Jeffrey Epstein, Andrew Mountbatten Windsor, and yes even Adolf Hitler. Should that understanding not influence our own attitude towards those people?
Be very careful when refusing cheap grace for others, lest you find the price of grace for yourself to be too expensive.
I'm not sure how to reconcile this call not to exercise any form of judgment with the position that we should encourage those we have judged to be doing wrong to repent and possibly suffer legal penalties. How can we call for the repentance of Epstein or Hitler (or, more accurately, their still-living equivalents) if we're unable judge whether their actions are right or wrong?
Regardless of whatever our intentions or internal motivations might be, we're all still responsible for (and judged according to) our actions, and the kind of cheap grace @Marvin the Martian describes is one of the big factors enabling elite impunity. One of the most appalling thing about Jeffrey Epstein's* infamous "birthday book" is the way it indicates that a lot of Epstein's wealthy friends knew that he was sex trafficking minors and their reaction isn't one of horror or judgment but something along the lines of "there goes Jeffrey again, with his amusing sex trafficking". They essentially put @Marvin the Martian's principle into action, regarding Epstein not as a sex trafficker but rather as a good person who sometimes sexually trafficked underage girls. None of them thought that Epstein "doing something morally repugnant [ made him ] a morally repugnant person" and, more importantly, none of them seem to have done anything like reporting this to the authorities.
That's not "my principle" - nothing I've said means one shouldn't condemn evil or report/prosecute crimes, and indeed truly loving someone can mean helping them to repent of the evil they've done and make restitution to those affected (which may include a lengthy prison sentence where appropriate). I just don't agree that people are forever defined as people by the worst things they've ever done. A person is who they are on their worst day, true, but they are also who they are on every other day of their life. The bad and the good coexist within us all - to greater and lesser extents, yes, but never to the extent that one completely obliterates the other.
Do we not believe in a God who forgives sins? Do we not follow Christ, who refused to condemn even those who nailed him to the cross, instead praying for them to be forgiven? Did He not say "Do not judge, or you too will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you."? How can we believe that and yet pronounce eternal condemnation on others? How can we proclaim that Christ died for us without understanding that He also died for Jeffrey Epstein, Andrew Mountbatten Windsor, and yes even Adolf Hitler. Should that understanding not influence our own attitude towards those people?
Be very careful when refusing cheap grace for others, lest you find the price of grace for yourself to be too expensive.
Firstly, lots of Shipmates do not believe in any kind of God. This is not a new phenomenon, so I'm not sure why you're making some very ITTWACW-flavoured assumptions.
There is nothing to suggest that Andrew Mountbatten Windsor has done any kind of repenting nor developed better behaviour. As someone who has never done anything like what he has been accused of, I feel very comfortable being judged in the same way because I haven't done anything resembling those things. All signs point towards Andrew being greedy and stupid and driven by material gain, none of which applies to me. I don't say that to brag - I have plenty of other faults - but being judged in the manner that I judge Andrew Mountbatten Windsor isn't something I would fear. If I was measured on the measure I use against Andrew, nothing would show up.
God can forgive Andrew all God wants, I'm not obligated to do so and neither are his alleged victims.
That's not "my principle" - nothing I've said means one shouldn't condemn evil or report/prosecute crimes, and indeed truly loving someone can mean helping them to repent of the evil they've done and make restitution to those affected (which may include a lengthy prison sentence where appropriate). I just don't agree that people are forever defined as people by the worst things they've ever done. A person is who they are on their worst day, true, but they are also who they are on every other day of their life. The bad and the good coexist within us all - to greater and lesser extents, yes, but never to the extent that one completely obliterates the other.
Do we not believe in a God who forgives sins? Do we not follow Christ, who refused to condemn even those who nailed him to the cross, instead praying for them to be forgiven? Did He not say "Do not judge, or you too will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you."? How can we believe that and yet pronounce eternal condemnation on others? How can we proclaim that Christ died for us without understanding that He also died for Jeffrey Epstein, Andrew Mountbatten Windsor, and yes even Adolf Hitler. Should that understanding not influence our own attitude towards those people?
Be very careful when refusing cheap grace for others, lest you find the price of grace for yourself to be too expensive.
I'm not sure how to reconcile this call not to exercise any form of judgment with the position that we should encourage those we have judged to be doing wrong to repent and possibly suffer legal penalties. How can we call for the repentance of Epstein or Hitler (or, more accurately, their still-living equivalents) if we're unable judge whether their actions are right or wrong?
You’re misrepresenting what @Marvin the Martian said, I think. Where does he say we should not exercise “any form of judgment”?
To the contrary, he explicitly says:
nothing I've said means one shouldn't condemn evil or report/prosecute crimes, and indeed truly loving someone can mean helping them to repent of the evil they've done and make restitution to those affected (which may include a lengthy prison sentence where appropriate). I just don't agree that people are forever defined as people by the worst things they've ever done.
He also says “How can we believe [judge not lest you be judged] and yet pronounce eternal condemnation on others?” (My emphasis.)
The judgments we are warned not to engage in are not judgments about whether actions are right or wrong, but rather about whether people are lost (or damned) or saved (or redeemed). This is consistent with the distinction MtM has clearly made between judging actions and judging people based only on their worst actions.
As someone who has never done anything like what he has been accused of, I feel very comfortable being judged in the same way because I haven't done anything resembling those things.
Sorry, but I’m afraid this has a whiff of “Thank God I am not like that sinner over there.” Given Jesus’s admonition that insulting others is a violation of the commandment not to commit murder, I’m very hesitant to go down the “I’ve never done anything that bad” road.
I haven’t seen anywhere that MtM has said we’re all required to forgive Andrew Mountbatten Windsor. He has made what I would have thought is the uncontroversial point that it’s not our place to damn him.
I have a technical question - that perhaps an American can answer - the allegations have always been (as far as I know) that Andrew had sex with Epstein & Maxwell’s victim when she was 17. But when people talk about it he do so implying she was under the age of consent - but as far as I can tell the age of consent in New York is 17 ? Do the legal aspects of the case boil down solely to whether he knew she was trafficked or not ?
Not surprised no one has taken this on as it is probably complicated and technical.
At a high level, assuming that she was of age, the issue is likely not specifically whether he knew she was trafficked but whether he knew there was no consent. Of course one might follow from the other but you’d want to know more about the facts. I would think that any sensible person would have known that hanging out with Epstein puts you in a zone of legal risk for committing sexual offences, which obviously reflects on Andrew’s character and judgment even if he is not actually guilty of criminal offences.
I was listening earlier to a podcast about Argentina. Famously there was an horrific underground transportation system for war criminals after WW2 which took them there. It seems like some in the government there knew exactly who they were but welcomed them anyway.
As far as I'm concerned there's a limit to forgiveness. And that limit is related to accountability and the victims. If the victim decides to forgive the offender in order to help his reform then that's very noble.
But it's not obligatory. And furthermore it isn't the place of people who are not the victims to insist that other people should think as they think.
Andrew undoubtedly hung around with offenders. Others may diminish this reality, but that is a fact.
If or when he admits his faults and shows genuine signs of change, which would include admitting anything else that he has done in this context, there might be space for forgiveness.
But the consequences of that forgiveness might well be that he exists in a solitary existence of penitence for the rest of his days.
There is no world where this stuff just gets brushed under the carpet because some people insist that we've all moved on. We haven't all moved on.
I'm not sure how to reconcile this call not to exercise any form of judgment with the position that we should encourage those we have judged to be doing wrong to repent and possibly suffer legal penalties. How can we call for the repentance of Epstein or Hitler (or, more accurately, their still-living equivalents) if we're unable judge whether their actions are right or wrong?
You’re misrepresenting what @Marvin the Martian said, I think. Where does he say we should not exercise “any form of judgment”?
Right here. I even put it in bold when I quoted it.
nothing I've said means one shouldn't condemn evil or report/prosecute crimes, and indeed truly loving someone can mean helping them to repent of the evil they've done and make restitution to those affected (which may include a lengthy prison sentence where appropriate). I just don't agree that people are forever defined as people by the worst things they've ever done.
He also says “How can we believe [judge not lest you be judged] and yet pronounce eternal condemnation on others?” (My emphasis.)
Hence my request for clarification. These are two irreconcilable standards, don't judge others, but do judge them enough to decide whether they merit condemnation or other penalties. As for whether such condemnation is "eternal", no afterlife belief system I'm aware of is based on majority vote amongst the living. Nor is the condemnation by any mortal person "eternal", since such condemnation will expire with the person making the judgement.
I haven’t seen anywhere that MtM has said we’re all required to forgive Andrew Mountbatten Windsor. He has made what I would have thought is the uncontroversial point that it’s not our place to damn him.
Damn, or condemn? There's enough shared etymology there to leave a lot of ambiguity. Given @Marvin the Martian started out with a warning against judging people's worst deeds his focus seems a lot more worldly than his apologists are claiming. His initial claim is about whether we should condemn people for their worst actions, not about what some supernatural outside entity should (or would) do.
As someone who has never done anything like what he has been accused of, I feel very comfortable being judged in the same way because I haven't done anything resembling those things.
Sorry, but I’m afraid this has a whiff of “Thank God I am not like that sinner over there.” Given Jesus’s admonition that insulting others is a violation of the commandment not to commit murder, I’m very hesitant to go down the “I’ve never done anything that bad” road.
I haven’t seen anywhere that MtM has said we’re all required to forgive Andrew Mountbatten Windsor. He has made what I would have thought is the uncontroversial point that it’s not our place to damn him.
But I've explicitly said that I have plenty of faults, just not these ones specifically. Also, why shouldn't people be glad that they aren't sexual predators? That seems like an eminently reasonable thing to not want to be.
In reality, insulting someone is not actually like murder. No matter how ill will I wish towards someone, if I haven't harmed them then I haven't harmed them. I think most people would prefer to be insulted rather than murdered.
I'm not sure how to reconcile this call not to exercise any form of judgment with the position that we should encourage those we have judged to be doing wrong to repent and possibly suffer legal penalties. How can we call for the repentance of Epstein or Hitler (or, more accurately, their still-living equivalents) if we're unable judge whether their actions are right or wrong?
You’re misrepresenting what @Marvin the Martian said, I think. Where does he say we should not exercise “any form of judgment”?
Right here. I even put it in bold when I quoted it.
nothing I've said means one shouldn't condemn evil or report/prosecute crimes, and indeed truly loving someone can mean helping them to repent of the evil they've done and make restitution to those affected (which may include a lengthy prison sentence where appropriate). I just don't agree that people are forever defined as people by the worst things they've ever done.
He also says “How can we believe [judge not lest you be judged] and yet pronounce eternal condemnation on others?” (My emphasis.)
Hence my request for clarification. These are two irreconcilable standards, don't judge others, but do judge them enough to decide whether they merit condemnation or other penalties.
Sorry, but I think there’s only confusion if you lift that one sentence you quoted out of the context of @Marvin the Martian’s full post.
I haven’t seen anywhere that MtM has said we’re all required to forgive Andrew Mountbatten Windsor. He has made what I would have thought is the uncontroversial point that it’s not our place to damn him.
Damn, or condemn? There's enough shared etymology there to leave a lot of ambiguity. Given @Marvin the Martian started out with a warning against judging people's worst deeds his focus seems a lot more worldly than his apologists are claiming. His initial claim is about whether we should condemn people for their worst actions, not about what some supernatural outside entity should (or would) do.
Again, if you read all that he has said, I think he has been clear in the difference between condemning actions and condemning in toto the person.
As someone who has never done anything like what he has been accused of, I feel very comfortable being judged in the same way because I haven't done anything resembling those things.
Sorry, but I’m afraid this has a whiff of “Thank God I am not like that sinner over there.” Given Jesus’s admonition that insulting others is a violation of the commandment not to commit murder, I’m very hesitant to go down the “I’ve never done anything that bad” road.
I haven’t seen anywhere that MtM has said we’re all required to forgive Andrew Mountbatten Windsor. He has made what I would have thought is the uncontroversial point that it’s not our place to damn him.
But I've explicitly said that I have plenty of faults, just not these ones specifically. Also, why shouldn't people be glad that they aren't sexual predators? That seems like an eminently reasonable thing to not want to be.
I didn’t say you haven’t acknowledged you have faults, nor did I say there’s anything wrong with being glad one isn’t a sexual predator. I said this statement:
As someone who has never done anything like what he has been accused of, I feel very comfortable being judged in the same way because I haven't done anything resembling those things.
comes across to me a bit like “Thank God I’m not like that sinner over there.” Actually, I believe original line is “like that tax collector,” with the implication of “I may have my faults, but at least I’m not as bad as him.”
In reality, insulting someone is not actually like murder. No matter how ill will I wish towards someone, if I haven't harmed them then I haven't harmed them. I think most people would prefer to be insulted rather than murdered.
And yet we have Jesus saying:
You have heard that it was said to those of ancient times, “You shall not murder”; and “whoever murders shall be liable to judgment.” But I say to you that if you are angry with a brother or sister, you will be liable to judgment; and if you insult a brother or sister, you will be liable to the council; and if you say, “You fool,” you will be liable to the hell of fire.
Matthew 5:21-23.
I really don’t know how to take that other than as Jesus letting us know that at judgment-time, any claim of something like “well, I didn’t commit murder” is likely to be met with a response along the lines of “yeah, well let me note the various other ways you denied God’s image in your neighbors, which is just as bad.”
I just don’t see any gain in the “at least I haven’t done that” game. The bottom line is that we’re all sinners and we all deserve God’s condemnation. And the Good News is that despite that, God acts with grace toward us. All of us. Even the murderers and sex offenders.
And if I treat my neighbors—and yes, even Andrew Mountbatten Windsor is my neighbor—as though they are beyond that grace, then I am both failing to love my neighbor as myself and at risk of placing myself beyond that grace. Because if anyone is beyond it, how can I be sure I’m not also beyond it?
I would think that any sensible person would have known that hanging out with Epstein puts you in a zone of legal risk for committing sexual offences, which obviously reflects on Andrew’s character and judgment even if he is not actually guilty of criminal offences.
I'm not entirely sure about that.
The world is full of attractive young women hanging off the arms of rich old men, and in many cases attractive young women married to rich old men. Many of these arrangements might seem a little mercenary, but are also entirely consensual. There are entire websites devoted to facilitating this sort of commercial arrangement. Would it have been obvious to Epstein's guests that many of his victims were underage, and that his modus operandi was more one of coercion than of consent?
I'm not sure.
The lines between louche playboy and predator aren't so clear.
Mountbatten Windsor's character is well known: he didn't acquire the sobriquet "Randy Andy" for nothing.
Again, if you read all that he has said, I think he has been clear in the difference between condemning actions and condemning in toto the person.
And I'm not sure it's valid to make the distinction between a person's actions and who they are. If someone commits murder they typically get describe as "a murderer". We usually don't go to the length of describing them as "a person who sometimes commits murder, but may have other qualities or interests as well". Aside from the unwieldiness of the phrase, it seems to be casting a whole lot of caveats where none are really warranted. Who doesn't have other interests or qualities? It tends to indicate that the speaker doesn't regard murder as bad per se, or at least is something that should, in this particular instance, be overlooked or ignored because of the person's other characteristics.
I would think that any sensible person would have known that hanging out with Epstein puts you in a zone of legal risk for committing sexual offences, which obviously reflects on Andrew’s character and judgment even if he is not actually guilty of criminal offences.
I'm not entirely sure about that.
The world is full of attractive young women hanging off the arms of rich old men, and in many cases attractive young women married to rich old men. Many of these arrangements might seem a little mercenary, but are also entirely consensual. There are entire websites devoted to facilitating this sort of commercial arrangement. Would it have been obvious to Epstein's guests that many of his victims were underage, and that his modus operandi was more one of coercion than of consent?
I'm not sure.
The lines between louche playboy and predator aren't so clear.
There's the other Epstein scandal that a lot of people seem to want to bury, which is how did Jeffrey Epstein get his money? Bloomberg and the Guardian have stories on the money laundering aspect of the scandal. Given the kind of fortune Epstein seems to have amassed (he did not come from a wealthy background) it seems very likely that at least some of the very rich and/or powerful people he associated with were also clients of his sex trafficking business.
The problem is that their press release gives the impression they intend to prosecute him for something but they don’t yet know for what and on what basis. Which is pretty much the opposite of ethical prosecution practice.
@Baptist Trainfan said:-
"@Marvin the Martian said:
Be very careful when refusing cheap grace for others, lest you find the price of grace for yourself to be too expensive."
I don't always agree with Marvin, but I think he is saying Wise Words here.
Whatever he might or might not have got up to, both Epstein and Mrs Guiffre are now incapable of answering any questions or giving evidence in any court. Besides, neither were people whom anyone in their right mind would regard either as persons of good repute or credible.
I haven't read up on her life - why do you think this about Virginia Giuffre?
@Ruth no, I have not read the book either. It has only just been published here, and I'm not interested enough to intend to. However, I did hear her ghost writer being interviewed on the radio here a few days ago and did not take to her. I also got the impression that she was very keen to sell the book and to grab every opportunity to promote it.
Again, if you read all that he has said, I think he has been clear in the difference between condemning actions and condemning in toto the person.
And I'm not sure it's valid to make the distinction between a person's actions and who they are. If someone commits murder they typically get describe as "a murderer". We usually don't go to the length of describing them as "a person who sometimes commits murder, but may have other qualities or interests as well". Aside from the unwieldiness of the phrase, it seems to be casting a whole lot of caveats where none are really warranted. Who doesn't have other interests or qualities? It tends to indicate that the speaker doesn't regard murder as bad per se, or at least is something that should, in this particular instance, be overlooked or ignored because of the person's other characteristics.
I don’t think it tends to indicate that at all, nor do I think it’s reasonable to infer that from anything said here.
Whatever he might or might not have got up to, both Epstein and Mrs Guiffre are now incapable of answering any questions or giving evidence in any court. Besides, neither were people whom anyone in their right mind would regard either as persons of good repute or credible.
I haven't read up on her life - why do you think this about Virginia Giuffre?
@Ruth no, I have not read the book either. It has only just been published here, and I'm not interested enough to intend to. However, I did hear her ghost writer being interviewed on the radio here a few days ago and did not take to her. I also got the impression that she was very keen to sell the book and to grab every opportunity to promote it.
A writer wants to sell the book they've written and thus earn a living. Imagine that.
Is this truly the basis on which you judge Virginia Giuffre to be not a person of good repute or credible? You didn't "take" to the ghost writer?
Our culture's emphasis on punishment as retribution has I think a a disastrous effect on our penal policy and treatment of prisoners. Now IIRC Croesos has frequently said that the idea that there's something wrong with this only really gains traction when someone rich and powerful risks punishment. Which is fair. I don't think I agree with the apparent implication that the suffering of poorer people in the carceral system is therefore an acceptable price to pay so that a few rich criminals get retributed against.
Of course, as pointed out above if one believes that punishment ought to rehabilitate that does imply that leniency requires contrition.
Comments
Well, if people are doing X, Y, or Z to Bill Cosby, and X, Y, and Z are illegal, then the police should deal with it. But any propensity to suicide on Cosby's part shouldn't be a determining factor in whether the police get involved.
So, if eg. Andrew now tries to make a career on the lecture circuit, and a group of people go around to all his venues and hold up signs on the public sidewalk denouncing him in language that would otherwise be legal, police in the UK would be able to stop the protests if they get a call from Andrew's psychiatrist saying they're making him suicidal?
Functionally, if police see anyone in a public space who they believe to be acutely mentally unwell to the point of being a risk to themself or others they can detain them under section 136 of the mental health act, and take them to a place of safety for a medical assessment. This is the power by which police detain people attempting to jump off bridges etc. Likewise, you can be detained against your will for mental health treatment if you are considered to be a risk to yourself or others as a result of a treatable mental illness.
If someone in that state is not treated, and then dies by suicide, it would be considered a failing of public services. It is in those kind of services that coroners do things like issue a prevention of future deaths notice.
Oh, okay. You were using the legal protocol around suicide in order to extrapolate how people should personally govern themselves with regards to those vulnerable to suicide.
IOW...
Since the police would intervene to stop Andrew Mountbatten Windsor if he was standing on a bridge threatening to jump, it makes moral sense that you, as an individual, should voluntarily avoid speech or actions toward Andrew Mountbatten Windsor that would encourage him toward suicide in the first place.
That said, if I were to get into the habit of publically lambasting someone with the personal record of Mountbatten Windsor, I'm not sure I would think myself obligated to stop just because I heard it was making him suicidal, even as I might acknowledge an obligation of the authorities to intervene to protect him from himself in the event that he actually does try to commit suicide.
Thanks for further clarifying. BUT...
Does "having regard for his welfare" just mean...
...going the extra mile to ensure the deterrence of activities already classified as criminal, eg. granting Mountbatten Windsor a voucher to hire private security to stop haters from trespassing onto and vandalizing his property, OR...
...would it also include prohibiting certain activities which, while normally considered okay, have been designated criminal specifically when carried out against Mountbatten Windsor, eg. my earlier hypothetical of declaring no-protest bubbles around his speaking venues?
I have to admit this has a bad smell to it… an organization with an obvious political agenda seeking to bring a private prosecution without any sign of an actual complainant.
Whenever I hear the phrase "private prosecution", I assume it's gonna be based on evidence somewhere in the vicinity of the 1970s TV show In Search Of....
(Granted, the only cases that come to mind are, in order of my hearing about them, are: some animal-rights militants in Canada prosrcuting some lab scientists in the 1980s, and Mary Whitehouse vs Gay Jesus in the 1970s.)
To be fair there have been publicly discussed concerns about Andrew’s business deals for many years - most recently this affair.. He was pressured to stop being trade envoy in 2011 and then there were concerns about him hanging out with a Chinese spy.
The King has essentially ostracised his own brother. In previous centuries this would be locking him into the tower.
Ok yes there's some cash attached to the arrangement, but then it sounds like there is no royal security and maybe minimal staff. Which sounds ridiculous to ordinary working people, but maybe the truth is that Andrew will be paying for his own effective imprisonment.
We don't know what he has been told, but it might not be a stretch to imagine that the King has put restrictions on Andrews activities. Maybe he's not welcome in London. Maybe he's not expected to hobnob with the set he is use to being in.
Maybe, in fact, he's not expected to leave the Sandringham estate.
Of course the alternative is that the King has given Andrew a rundown cottage in a remote royal estate with the understanding that he will never accept that life and instead will jet off to Bangkok, Brunei or Dubai and become someone else's problem.
I rather like the idea that Charles has discovered he still has some levers to punish wayward relatives with his own form of imprisonment.
It does rather sound like he is being placed under "house arrest".
As to him jetting off to Dubai or Bahrain or some otherwhere to become somebody else's problem, he will always share the royal family's blood and name. He will always be a "family problem".
Also - he knows what he knows and can name other names. I wonder if he will ever be tried in a constitutional court.
AFF
That's not "my principle" - nothing I've said means one shouldn't condemn evil or report/prosecute crimes, and indeed truly loving someone can mean helping them to repent of the evil they've done and make restitution to those affected (which may include a lengthy prison sentence where appropriate). I just don't agree that people are forever defined as people by the worst things they've ever done. A person is who they are on their worst day, true, but they are also who they are on every other day of their life. The bad and the good coexist within us all - to greater and lesser extents, yes, but never to the extent that one completely obliterates the other.
Do we not believe in a God who forgives sins? Do we not follow Christ, who refused to condemn even those who nailed him to the cross, instead praying for them to be forgiven? Did He not say "Do not judge, or you too will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you."? How can we believe that and yet pronounce eternal condemnation on others? How can we proclaim that Christ died for us without understanding that He also died for Jeffrey Epstein, Andrew Mountbatten Windsor, and yes even Adolf Hitler. Should that understanding not influence our own attitude towards those people?
Be very careful when refusing cheap grace for others, lest you find the price of grace for yourself to be too expensive.
The problem is that their press release gives the impression they intend to prosecute him for something but they don’t yet know for what and on what basis. Which is pretty much the opposite of ethical prosecution practice.
Be very careful when refusing cheap grace for others, lest you find the price of grace for yourself to be too expensive.
I don't always agree with Marvin, but I think he is saying Wise Words here.
This is very true, thank you.
Will you understand me if I point out that there's still a difference between the repentant and the unrepentant, and therefore it's necessary to handle the second kind very carefully to prevent them carrying on with their evils? Not saying to them "this is all you can ever be," but rather saying "for your own sake and the sake of others, until we see clear evidence of a change in you, the following restrictions will apply". There are folks I wouldn't invite into my home, not because I loathe them morally but because there are vulnerable young people there who might be at risk. I don't think Christ expects us to pitch common sense out the door--just judgmentalism and pride.
But unless you're likely to be doing anything as terrible as eg Epstein, why would the price of grace for yourself be too expensive?
I'm not sure how to reconcile this call not to exercise any form of judgment with the position that we should encourage those we have judged to be doing wrong to repent and possibly suffer legal penalties. How can we call for the repentance of Epstein or Hitler (or, more accurately, their still-living equivalents) if we're unable judge whether their actions are right or wrong?
Firstly, lots of Shipmates do not believe in any kind of God. This is not a new phenomenon, so I'm not sure why you're making some very ITTWACW-flavoured assumptions.
There is nothing to suggest that Andrew Mountbatten Windsor has done any kind of repenting nor developed better behaviour. As someone who has never done anything like what he has been accused of, I feel very comfortable being judged in the same way because I haven't done anything resembling those things. All signs point towards Andrew being greedy and stupid and driven by material gain, none of which applies to me. I don't say that to brag - I have plenty of other faults - but being judged in the manner that I judge Andrew Mountbatten Windsor isn't something I would fear. If I was measured on the measure I use against Andrew, nothing would show up.
God can forgive Andrew all God wants, I'm not obligated to do so and neither are his alleged victims.
To the contrary, he explicitly says:
He also says “How can we believe [judge not lest you be judged] and yet pronounce eternal condemnation on others?” (My emphasis.)
The judgments we are warned not to engage in are not judgments about whether actions are right or wrong, but rather about whether people are lost (or damned) or saved (or redeemed). This is consistent with the distinction MtM has clearly made between judging actions and judging people based only on their worst actions.
Sorry, but I’m afraid this has a whiff of “Thank God I am not like that sinner over there.” Given Jesus’s admonition that insulting others is a violation of the commandment not to commit murder, I’m very hesitant to go down the “I’ve never done anything that bad” road.
I haven’t seen anywhere that MtM has said we’re all required to forgive Andrew Mountbatten Windsor. He has made what I would have thought is the uncontroversial point that it’s not our place to damn him.
Not surprised no one has taken this on as it is probably complicated and technical.
At a high level, assuming that she was of age, the issue is likely not specifically whether he knew she was trafficked but whether he knew there was no consent. Of course one might follow from the other but you’d want to know more about the facts. I would think that any sensible person would have known that hanging out with Epstein puts you in a zone of legal risk for committing sexual offences, which obviously reflects on Andrew’s character and judgment even if he is not actually guilty of criminal offences.
As far as I'm concerned there's a limit to forgiveness. And that limit is related to accountability and the victims. If the victim decides to forgive the offender in order to help his reform then that's very noble.
But it's not obligatory. And furthermore it isn't the place of people who are not the victims to insist that other people should think as they think.
Andrew undoubtedly hung around with offenders. Others may diminish this reality, but that is a fact.
If or when he admits his faults and shows genuine signs of change, which would include admitting anything else that he has done in this context, there might be space for forgiveness.
But the consequences of that forgiveness might well be that he exists in a solitary existence of penitence for the rest of his days.
There is no world where this stuff just gets brushed under the carpet because some people insist that we've all moved on. We haven't all moved on.
Right here. I even put it in bold when I quoted it.
Hence my request for clarification. These are two irreconcilable standards, don't judge others, but do judge them enough to decide whether they merit condemnation or other penalties. As for whether such condemnation is "eternal", no afterlife belief system I'm aware of is based on majority vote amongst the living. Nor is the condemnation by any mortal person "eternal", since such condemnation will expire with the person making the judgement.
Damn, or condemn? There's enough shared etymology there to leave a lot of ambiguity. Given @Marvin the Martian started out with a warning against judging people's worst deeds his focus seems a lot more worldly than his apologists are claiming. His initial claim is about whether we should condemn people for their worst actions, not about what some supernatural outside entity should (or would) do.
But I've explicitly said that I have plenty of faults, just not these ones specifically. Also, why shouldn't people be glad that they aren't sexual predators? That seems like an eminently reasonable thing to not want to be.
In reality, insulting someone is not actually like murder. No matter how ill will I wish towards someone, if I haven't harmed them then I haven't harmed them. I think most people would prefer to be insulted rather than murdered.
Again, if you read all that he has said, I think he has been clear in the difference between condemning actions and condemning in toto the person.
I didn’t say you haven’t acknowledged you have faults, nor did I say there’s anything wrong with being glad one isn’t a sexual predator. I said this statement: comes across to me a bit like “Thank God I’m not like that sinner over there.” Actually, I believe original line is “like that tax collector,” with the implication of “I may have my faults, but at least I’m not as bad as him.”
And yet we have Jesus saying: Matthew 5:21-23.
I really don’t know how to take that other than as Jesus letting us know that at judgment-time, any claim of something like “well, I didn’t commit murder” is likely to be met with a response along the lines of “yeah, well let me note the various other ways you denied God’s image in your neighbors, which is just as bad.”
I just don’t see any gain in the “at least I haven’t done that” game. The bottom line is that we’re all sinners and we all deserve God’s condemnation. And the Good News is that despite that, God acts with grace toward us. All of us. Even the murderers and sex offenders.
And if I treat my neighbors—and yes, even Andrew Mountbatten Windsor is my neighbor—as though they are beyond that grace, then I am both failing to love my neighbor as myself and at risk of placing myself beyond that grace. Because if anyone is beyond it, how can I be sure I’m not also beyond it?
Make of this what you will; it is not my duty (on this site with ITTWACW looming) to do more than quote.
I'm not entirely sure about that.
The world is full of attractive young women hanging off the arms of rich old men, and in many cases attractive young women married to rich old men. Many of these arrangements might seem a little mercenary, but are also entirely consensual. There are entire websites devoted to facilitating this sort of commercial arrangement. Would it have been obvious to Epstein's guests that many of his victims were underage, and that his modus operandi was more one of coercion than of consent?
I'm not sure.
The lines between louche playboy and predator aren't so clear.
Mountbatten Windsor's character is well known: he didn't acquire the sobriquet "Randy Andy" for nothing.
And I'm not sure it's valid to make the distinction between a person's actions and who they are. If someone commits murder they typically get describe as "a murderer". We usually don't go to the length of describing them as "a person who sometimes commits murder, but may have other qualities or interests as well". Aside from the unwieldiness of the phrase, it seems to be casting a whole lot of caveats where none are really warranted. Who doesn't have other interests or qualities? It tends to indicate that the speaker doesn't regard murder as bad per se, or at least is something that should, in this particular instance, be overlooked or ignored because of the person's other characteristics.
There's the other Epstein scandal that a lot of people seem to want to bury, which is how did Jeffrey Epstein get his money? Bloomberg and the Guardian have stories on the money laundering aspect of the scandal. Given the kind of fortune Epstein seems to have amassed (he did not come from a wealthy background) it seems very likely that at least some of the very rich and/or powerful people he associated with were also clients of his sex trafficking business.
An extra question though. What does ITTWACW please?
At one time, anyway, you could but Ship merch with the acronym on it.
A writer wants to sell the book they've written and thus earn a living. Imagine that.
Is this truly the basis on which you judge Virginia Giuffre to be not a person of good repute or credible? You didn't "take" to the ghost writer?
Of course, as pointed out above if one believes that punishment ought to rehabilitate that does imply that leniency requires contrition.
Monarchia est delenda.(*)
(*) The monarchy should be abolished.