Extreme punishments

Retribution and revenge are dangerous motivations in the hands of people with power. All I knew about Kevin Spacey until now was that he was a phenonimally good and mesmerising actor. So he's gay! So what? But he's a late late admitted gay AND he's accused of behaving very inappropriately with a 14-year-old male actor 30 years ago during a drunken party. No condoning here, but unless Spacey turns out to have been a serial predator all his life, why on earth is the book being thrown at him? It's like he has suddenly overnight turned ino Dracula. Netflix, I'm sure an upholder of moral values, has cancelled the next series of House of Cards, actors are shunning him, people are whispering "we knew all about Kevin", and the Daily Mail has splashed on it Online as if our very existence is now at stake. This is Kevin Spacey, right? Not the Yorkshire Ripper! I have no doubt that other male actors will creep forward and say they had nasty experiences a long time ago but how long does this purging and witch hunting have to go on? Kevin Spacey, as far as a lot of people are concerned, is now an ex-person. It's sad, very sad, and the latest example of how human weaknesses are now being treated like the Middle Ages used to treat suspected witches. Thus the witch hunt analogy. Punishment has to be extreme. Take also the case of ex-President Carlos Puigdemont of Catalonia. He is no General Franco. He didn't seize power by force and kill dissenters in the streets. He's a democratic fellow who wanted to fulfil his dream of leading an independent country within Spain. I don't support his cause and, technically, he acted unconstitutionally by holding a referendum, and thus the vote in favour of a Catalan Republic was not recognised around the world. nor by a lot of people in Catalonia and certainly not in Spain as a whole. But the Madrid prosecutors want to charge him with sedition and treachery and put him away for 30 years. Now that smells more of Franco than the badly-haircutted former president of Catalonia's misdeeds. It's about seeing to be tough, so no one ever again will dare to declare independence within the territory of Spain. But to me it smacks of revenge and retribution. Harvey Weinstein deserves the extreme punishment of banishment if even half the allegations against him are true. But Puigdemont is no Guy Fawkes, and Kevin Spacey, so far as we know, is not a monster from hell, and still a brilliant actor.