To have regrets is part of the human condition.
Who doesn't have at least one intemperate comment or lamentable episode that they'd rather not remember?
Coming to terms with imperfection in oneself and others is part of life, especially in the Internet age where information lives forever.
Unless, of course, you reside in the European Union, where an emerging "right to be forgotten" allows people to erase the digital connective tissue to embarrassing information, even if accurate.
What arrogance to think people should be able to edit history, an undertaking that inevitably will be manipulated by the powerful and undermined by the vast reach of the Internet.
Thank goodness we live in a country that so values free speech that we would never allow such a thing, right?
I wish it were so.
Across the country and even in Colorado, there have been recent efforts to block access to arrest records, convictions and even legally obtained but humiliating photographs.
Funny how much less we value fundamental rights when they protect things we don't like.
Last week, the EU's highest court ruled that Google has to yield to requests from individuals to erase links to information that is "inadequate, irrelevant or no longer relevant."
The Spaniard who brought the case was distressed that a search of his name led to information published in a newspaper in 1998 about debts he had since repaid.
This European notion of privacy comes out of the French droit l'oubli, or right to oblivion, which holds that after criminals have served their time, they should be able to hide their past.
It's not a big intellectual leap to a bill debated in the Colorado legislature this year that would have eased the way for sealing records of those convicted of marijuana crimes.
The logic was that those transgressions are no longer illegal since voters passed Amendment 64, and people with marijuana records were having trouble getting bank loans and jobs.
Even if marijuana use doesn't carry the same stigma it once did, a conviction speaks to someone's willingness to break the law on the books at the time.
And that does say something.
This measure, which failed, was pitched a year after successful legislation that had already liberalized sealings.
When people argue for the ability to seal criminal records, they inevitably point to disadvantaged individuals who have little hope of being able to overcome a record and lead a productive life.
And that's a fair point.
But think about it for a moment. Who is most likely to have the resources to navigate complex sealing laws and take advantage of such an opportunity?
Those who already have money and power, that's who. And those left with records are the people without the wherewithal to work the system. Record sealings broaden the divide between the haves and the have-nots.
That is the same thing that likely will happen in the EU with this "right to be forgotten," an idea that caught fire during the last few years.
Europeans who know how to work the system will, and those who don't will not. The ruling also will involve significant costs. And you know that removing useful information from sight is bound to result in some dreadful unintended consequences.
The EU case and similar censorship actions are efforts — futile, in my estimation — to rein in the power of widely accessible information.
But by erasing history willy-nilly, we sell short the capacity of institutions and individuals to adapt to the implications of the information age.
Perhaps we all just need a little more faith in the human capacity for discretion and tolerance.
E-mail Alicia Caldwell at firstname.lastname@example.org or follow her on Twitter: @AliciaMCaldwell