A Man for All Seasons
by Robert Bolt · first published 1960
9mentions
2recommended by
9HN commenters
2015–2025first – last mentioned
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…they get. The totalitarian surveillance system is about control, not safety, always remember that! "Go again and see not just the film and the play but read the text of Robert Bolt's wonderful play "Man For All Seasons", some of you must have seen it - where Sir Thomas Moore decides that he would rather die than lie or betray his faith and at one moment Moore is arguing with a particularly vicious witch-hunting prosecutor…
on “Danish military intelligence uses XKEYSCORE to tap cables in co-op with the NSA” ↗…of obtaining a prosecution is on the table then there's not really much to the constitutional order to begin with. Robert Bolt, one of the great playwrights of the 20th century, recognized this in "A Man for All Seasons". There's a brief excerpt of the film on Youtube that resonates particularly well today: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NUqytjlHNIM&ab_channel=Crass...
on “How Police Exploited the Capitol Riot’s Digital Records” ↗…whether it counts as legal evidence. And it's my understanding that, no matter how good your spidey sense is, it does not become PC in a legal sense until it is articulable. As Thomas Moore said in A Man for All Seasons: "The world must construe according to its wits; this court, according to the law."
on “Court rules drug dog barely more accurate than a coin flip is good enough” ↗…down, and you're just the man to do it, do you really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then? Yes, I'd give the Devil benefit of law, for my own safety's sake! - Robert Bolt, A Man for All Seasons: https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/7515521-william-roper-so-no... In particular, I'm fairly sure everyone who bombs abortion clinics[0] tells themselves that the laws they break are the unjust ones, because…
on “Facebook Gave Police Teenager's DMs in Abortion Prosecution” ↗“Oh? And, when the last law was down, and the Devil turned round on you – where would you hide, Roper, the laws all being flat?” — A Man for All Seasons, Robert Bolt, 1960
on “You can deactivate anyone's WhatsApp account by simply sending an email” ↗…speak as you do would make excellent villains in stories with nuanced morality. You seem certain that you're in the right as you speak of murdering people. This exemplifies realistic evil. From A Man for All Seasons, a play by Robert Bolt: Roper: So now you’d give the Devil benefit of law? More: Yes. What would you do? Cut a great road through the law to get after the Devil? Roper: I’d cut down every law in England…
on “Science Fiction vs. Science Fantasy” ↗…down, and you're just the man to do it, do you really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then? Yes, I'd give the Devil benefit of law, for my own safety's sake!” ― Robert Bolt, A Man for All Seasons: A Play in Two Acts
on “What Transport for London can learn about us from our mobiles” ↗…become less creative, less innovative. Now it's just a variation on a theme. Does such work really deserve the same level of recognition as befitted Beethoven for his Ninth or Robert Bolt for his "A Man for all Seasons"?
on “The hidden cost of AI coding” ↗…down, and you're just the man to do it, do you really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then? Yes, I'd give the Devil benefit of law, for my own safety's sake!” ― Robert Bolt, A Man for All Seasons: A Play in Two Acts
on “In Re: 23andMe, Inc. Customer Data Security Breach Litigation” ↗