It's because there is no consensus on any of those things, particularly political beliefs surrounding free software. The people who are saying free software is

It's because there is no consensus on any of those things, particularly political beliefs surrounding free software. The people who are saying free software is about scratching itches are generally not the same people who equate contributing to free software with fighting for the future of political and social freedom. You're not seeing contradictory positions because you're (usually) not seeing the same people state those positions. If it seems that way, it's because a given online discussion isn't a random sample of people's beliefs. For example, to someone reading Reddit or Slashdot (or HN sometimes, unfortunately), it's easy to jump to the conclusion that everything sucks and everyone hates everything. Post an article about Python, and all the comments will be about how Python is terrible and everyone should use Ruby (or whatever). Post an article about Ruby, and all the comments will be about how Ruby is terrible and everyone should use Python (or whatever). Read the same site for long enough and it will start to look like a mass of contradictions- "wait, everyone here said Python sucked before and I should use Ruby, but now they're all saying Ruby sucks and I should use Python?!?" But really it's just different people showing up to disparage whatever the topic of discussion is. I think it's just the nature of the medium that makes it really hard to gauge consensus within a community.