Tough situation. I can understand him trying to hide the mistakes in his youth. I certainly wouldn’t want to be haunted by whatever idiotic things I did or said

Tough situation. I can understand him trying to hide the mistakes in his youth. I certainly wouldn’t want to be haunted by whatever idiotic things I did or said as a kid, although they definitely were nowhere near what this guy was doing. Admitting such things before building a career would instantly be a non-starter. I also think as a society we have to acknowledge that rehabilitation and forgiveness needs to be possible, especially for mistakes we make as kids. The mob seems to want people like this to be disappeared, which is unfortunate for a country so influenced by Christianity, in which forgiveness is a prime value. On the other hand, this guy seems to have really been a subscriber to some bad, dangerous ideas, and more importantly, he doesn’t seem to have done much to atone for it. Donating to the synagogue, getting involved with the community or somehow seeking forgiveness by acknowledging his mistakes would have been better than just hiding it. He didn’t need to do anything public that would dig up the past either: I imagine he could have donated or helped the synagogue in an pseudonymous way. Certainly the people he hurt would be far more willing to defend his rehabilitation now if he had done so.