A Man For All Seasons - Giving the Devil the Benefit of Law

CrassHeretic · 55.9K views · 2012-08-08 · 0:50

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Overview

A one-minute clip from the 1966 film A Man for All Seasons. Thomas More refuses to arrest the Devil, saying he would give even the Devil the benefit of law for his own safety's sake.

On Hacker News

HN uses the scene to argue for due process and for protecting the speech and rights of people you dislike.

Recommended by 1 HN people across 1 months · HN mentions 2018–2024

Topics

Film & TV clips Law, policing & justice Free speech, censorship & civil liberties

What people said

pseudolus · 2023-01 · Recommendation
If violating or diminishing constitutional rights for the purpose 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: [VIDEO]
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llm_trw · 2024-10 · Reference
To quote some of the people I know who would be impacted the most by this: > Freedom of speech is not freedom from consequences. If they'd not spend the last 10 years purging the old guard who they called free speech fanatics they'd have someone in their corner. Now I just have the world tiniest violin for them. Or to use much better words than mine: [VIDEO]
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someguydave · 2018-10 · Reference
1. Isn’t viewing someone as “beyond the pale” such that they deserve summary punishment and/or execution dehumanizing? How is that different than the guy who tortured small animals because he views them as objects and not living things? 2. Even those libertarians would give murderers and rapists benefit of a court of law where they can explain themselves. Consider this video: [VIDEO]
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Sources

Video by CrassHeretic, played through YouTube.

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