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I'll speak up: I'm happy that Stallman resigned from his positions, but the final straw for me was the surfacing of Stallman's pedophilic musings over the years

I'll speak up: I'm happy that Stallman resigned from his positions, but the final straw for me was the surfacing of Stallman's pedophilic musings over the years. You left that part out.

booleandilemma 7y ago
So is musing illegal now or what? Can people still have controversial opinions without getting their lives destroyed?
- CathedralBorrow 7y ago
  Stallman wasn't convicted of any crime, so please drop the "illegal" thing. He can have whatever controversial opinions he wants.
  - booleandilemma 7y ago
    He can have whatever controversial opinions he wants. Not without losing his job, apparently.
    - CathedralBorrow 7y ago
      Yes? Is it surprising to you that words can have consequences up to and including your employers no longer wanting to employ you?
      - booleandilemma 7y ago
        The problem with your line of thinking is that it discourages people from expressing their opinions if they deviate from the opinion of the majority. If people need to be concerned about having their lives ruined over what they write in an email, or an online forum, can’t you see what kind of chilling effect this has?
        CathedralBorrow 7y ago
        I mean of course words have consequences. Denying it is just absurd. If an employee of yours regularly expresses his opinion that your children are sexy and he'd like to have sex with them, what would you do about it that does not in any way discourage him from expressing his opinion? Surely you can't reprimand him or fire him. Or an employee that regularly talks publicly about how horrible your company is and that no one should work there. Can't discourage any expression of opinion, so what can you do?
        streb-lo 7y ago
        Don't even bother. I think most of the people defending Stallman in this thread aren't contributing members of society or are at least clueless in how the world operates.
      - virgilp 7y ago
        How about "looks". Is it surprising to you that physical aspect can have consequences up to and including your employers no longer wanting to employ you? Because what you said is such a broad generalization, that it feels "obviously true". But if you object to a person not being hired because she's black (although that's personally reasonable in some very limited circumstances) - then maybe you should object too for a person being dismissed on words completely unrelated to the work he was supposed to perform.
        CathedralBorrow 7y ago
        If you ran a company, would you make sure that none of your employees ever face consequences for expressing their opinions outside of work?
        doubleunplussed 7y ago
        I would try. It would be almost impossible in the current climate though, so I would be unlikely to succeed given that I myself could be removed over my position as soon as someone says something distasteful and I'm accused of either supporting it or creating a hostile environment for other employees. But the world I want to live in is one where employers take no action whatsoever for opinions expressed off the clock.
        CathedralBorrow 7y ago
        So ideally you'd have no qualms with a preschool teacher who blogs about how sex with children is perfectly fine in their spare time? Or an employee who regularly publishes manifestos on why people of certain skin colors should be murdered and exterminated? These are extreme examples of course, but you are saying that ideally no one should experience any consequences for expressing any opinion outside of work.
        doubleunplussed 7y ago
        Ideally, yes. It's not that they should face no consequences - they should face consequences in the circles in which they express those views, ideally in the form of people disagreeing with them, but possibly also wanting to dissociate with them. If they try to keep those views out of the classroom, I don't have a problem with it. In the classroom, you are the instrument of a consensus view. You must do your job. If you do it well, that's great. Your views outside the classroom should be irrelevant, and I can't help but notice that a lot of the time when people get in trouble for their views outside of work, it's because someone de-anonymised them. We cannot have a world where people's actual opinions are forced to be equal to those their employers would be comfortable with. Your extreme examples are extreme indeed, but there are many examples, particularly in authoritarian regimes, where the extreme view is the correct one. So extreme-ness is not a good metric for whether views should be allowed or not. I think the solution for everyone is to stay silent, and to discuss their views anonymously online. Their views will still have force at the ballot box - as they did at the last election (as much as I did not like the outcome, it was evidence that social shaming has limited power at changing how people vote). We should be suspicious of attempts to de-anonymise the internet. Basically, dissent is important. So important that it is worth tolerating bad views to ensure dissent is not suppressed when it is needed. Everyone who pictures the cancel-culture norms resulting in some sort of paradise where everyone believes nice things are delusional, they are simply ceding power to those who will use it for personal gain, and giving the currently powerful the tools to to cement that power.
      - cambalache 7y ago
        So would you agree if your employer fires you because of this chain of posts?
        CathedralBorrow 7y ago
        No, but I'd understand if I had been publicly saying that sometimes there's nothing wrong with having sex with children. When I say that words can have consequences, it matters which words you use.
  - eyko 7y ago
    One could argue that in the "court of public opinion" he very much was.
    - CathedralBorrow 7y ago
      Yes, his actions and words had consequences. Is this a new idea to you?
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
virgilp 7y ago
Actually, no, he didn't - he lead with it. > Diversity -- but no diversity of opinion... Is there any sort of evidence of action? Him having had sex with children? If anything, it's you who left out the part where Stallman already said, before this incindent, that he was wrong. I.e. he said it because he actually changed his mind and believes he was wrong, not in order to "save face" or clear his image or avoid scandal or whatnot.
- CathedralBorrow 7y ago
  If someone tells me they think that it's sometimes fine to have sex with children, I don't need any evidence of action to want to distance myself from that person. > If anything, it's you who left out the part where Stallman already said, before this incindent, that he was wrong. I.e. he said it because he actually changed his mind and believes he was wrong, not in order to "save face" or clear his image or avoid scandal or whatnot. He posted that after the storm had started, three days before his resignation. A few days after the "Remove Richard Stallman" Medium post was written. Do you think that's a complete coincidence? Has nothing to do with saving face and only his desire to explain that he had changed his mind?
  - dzamie 7y ago
    >they think that it's sometimes fine to have sex with children From what I can tell from the snippets posted here, he isn't saying it's fine, he's saying he's seen insufficient evidence to form an opinion - and in such a state, he resists those who would force one on him with faulty reasoning. Or, to put it another way, he views morality with three responses [yes, no, I don't know], which causes friction with people who view it with two: "Is involuntary pedophilia bad?" [yes] "Is all pedophilia bad?" [idk - insufficient evidence on voluntary or its inherent lack of existence] "Do you think that all pedophilia is bad?" [no - position held is idk, not yes] "Therefore, you think all pedophilia is good." [no - position held is idk, not yes] A similar comparison might be being asked if you enjoyed an unreleased book, then using "no[, I haven't read it and formed an opinion]" to justify "you think the book is bad." ETA: also, if he hasn't said more on the subject in recent years, it's silly to assume that he necessarily still hold these views or lack thereof.
lettergram 7y ago
Please provide a link. I’ve seen this repeated, but no source. I don’t necessarily doubt it, but if you don’t provide a link your basically committing slander.
- CathedralBorrow 7y ago
  “I am sceptical of the claim that voluntarily pedophilia harms children. The arguments that it causes harm seem to be based on cases which aren’t voluntary, which are then stretched by parents who are horrified by the idea that their little baby is maturing.” “There is little evidence to justify the widespread assumption that willing participation in pedophilia hurts children.“ I can give you the links but it's quite easy to Google. Edit since I dug them up for another comment: https://stallman.org/archives/2006-may-aug.html#05%20June%202006%20(Dutch%20paedophiles%20form%20political%20party) https://stallman.org/archives/2006-may-aug.html#05%20June%20... https://stallman.org/archives/2012-nov-feb.html#04_January_2013_(Pedophilia) https://stallman.org/archives/2012-nov-feb.html#04_January_2...
  - hizanberg 7y ago
    It's well-known he's since recanted his thoughts in those posts: https://stallman.org/archives/2019-jul-oct.html#14_September_2019_%28Sex_between_an_adult_and_a_child_is_wrong%29 https://stallman.org/archives/2019-jul-oct.html#14_September... Are people allowed to change their mind after having conversations that convince them that their position is wrong?
    - CathedralBorrow 7y ago
      Of course people are allowed to change their minds. But forgive me if I take a skeptical view of someone in their sixties suddenly saying "Contrary to my writings on the subject, I've recently learned that having sex with children is wrong" Especially if that recanting happens to take place right as the shitstorm about his writings and behavior has started.
      - 7y ago
seba_dos1 7y ago
What you call "pedophilic musings", I call natural thinking process that probably every critical thinker went through in their life. It even reaches standard socially-acceptable conclusion - it just took him way longer than usual (which frankly is hardly surprising).
- CathedralBorrow 7y ago
  Yeah, took him until a few days after the whole storm had started. Good timing to have such a profound reversal in your view on pedophilia.
  - seba_dos1 7y ago
    So? Stallman is the last person on earth I'd suspect of opportunistic opinion changing. The whole life of this person revolves around being stubborn in his point of view regardless of what others think about it. I've seen many people suggesting that that last note is a kind of "damage control", but that's probably the least believable accusation when it comes to rms.
    - CathedralBorrow 7y ago
      That's fine, I'm just skeptical. I'm sure he'd understand.
  - flukus 7y ago
    Because he probably forgot about it until then. He comments on half a dozen things a day, out of tens of thousands of comments over 2 decades only 2 were about this issue so it's not as if it was a firmly held personal conviction.
    - CathedralBorrow 7y ago
      I don't know about you, but I don't think forgetting that you believe sex with children can be fine is any better really.

I'll speak up: I'm happy that Stallman resigned from his positions, but the final straw for me was the surfacing of Stallman's pedophilic musings over the years. You left that part out.

booleandilemma 7y ago

So is musing illegal now or what? Can people still have controversial opinions without getting their lives destroyed?

CathedralBorrow 7y ago
Stallman wasn't convicted of any crime, so please drop the "illegal" thing. He can have whatever controversial opinions he wants.
- booleandilemma 7y ago
  He can have whatever controversial opinions he wants. Not without losing his job, apparently.
  - CathedralBorrow 7y ago
    Yes? Is it surprising to you that words can have consequences up to and including your employers no longer wanting to employ you?
    - booleandilemma 7y ago
      The problem with your line of thinking is that it discourages people from expressing their opinions if they deviate from the opinion of the majority. If people need to be concerned about having their lives ruined over what they write in an email, or an online forum, can’t you see what kind of chilling effect this has?
      - CathedralBorrow 7y ago
        I mean of course words have consequences. Denying it is just absurd. If an employee of yours regularly expresses his opinion that your children are sexy and he'd like to have sex with them, what would you do about it that does not in any way discourage him from expressing his opinion? Surely you can't reprimand him or fire him. Or an employee that regularly talks publicly about how horrible your company is and that no one should work there. Can't discourage any expression of opinion, so what can you do?
        streb-lo 7y ago
        Don't even bother. I think most of the people defending Stallman in this thread aren't contributing members of society or are at least clueless in how the world operates.
    - virgilp 7y ago
      How about "looks". Is it surprising to you that physical aspect can have consequences up to and including your employers no longer wanting to employ you? Because what you said is such a broad generalization, that it feels "obviously true". But if you object to a person not being hired because she's black (although that's personally reasonable in some very limited circumstances) - then maybe you should object too for a person being dismissed on words completely unrelated to the work he was supposed to perform.
      - CathedralBorrow 7y ago
        If you ran a company, would you make sure that none of your employees ever face consequences for expressing their opinions outside of work?
        doubleunplussed 7y ago
        I would try. It would be almost impossible in the current climate though, so I would be unlikely to succeed given that I myself could be removed over my position as soon as someone says something distasteful and I'm accused of either supporting it or creating a hostile environment for other employees. But the world I want to live in is one where employers take no action whatsoever for opinions expressed off the clock.
        CathedralBorrow 7y ago
        So ideally you'd have no qualms with a preschool teacher who blogs about how sex with children is perfectly fine in their spare time? Or an employee who regularly publishes manifestos on why people of certain skin colors should be murdered and exterminated? These are extreme examples of course, but you are saying that ideally no one should experience any consequences for expressing any opinion outside of work.
        doubleunplussed 7y ago
        Ideally, yes. It's not that they should face no consequences - they should face consequences in the circles in which they express those views, ideally in the form of people disagreeing with them, but possibly also wanting to dissociate with them. If they try to keep those views out of the classroom, I don't have a problem with it. In the classroom, you are the instrument of a consensus view. You must do your job. If you do it well, that's great. Your views outside the classroom should be irrelevant, and I can't help but notice that a lot of the time when people get in trouble for their views outside of work, it's because someone de-anonymised them. We cannot have a world where people's actual opinions are forced to be equal to those their employers would be comfortable with. Your extreme examples are extreme indeed, but there are many examples, particularly in authoritarian regimes, where the extreme view is the correct one. So extreme-ness is not a good metric for whether views should be allowed or not. I think the solution for everyone is to stay silent, and to discuss their views anonymously online. Their views will still have force at the ballot box - as they did at the last election (as much as I did not like the outcome, it was evidence that social shaming has limited power at changing how people vote). We should be suspicious of attempts to de-anonymise the internet. Basically, dissent is important. So important that it is worth tolerating bad views to ensure dissent is not suppressed when it is needed. Everyone who pictures the cancel-culture norms resulting in some sort of paradise where everyone believes nice things are delusional, they are simply ceding power to those who will use it for personal gain, and giving the currently powerful the tools to to cement that power.
    - cambalache 7y ago
      So would you agree if your employer fires you because of this chain of posts?
      - CathedralBorrow 7y ago
        No, but I'd understand if I had been publicly saying that sometimes there's nothing wrong with having sex with children. When I say that words can have consequences, it matters which words you use.
- eyko 7y ago
  One could argue that in the "court of public opinion" he very much was.
  - CathedralBorrow 7y ago
    Yes, his actions and words had consequences. Is this a new idea to you?

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]

virgilp 7y ago

Actually, no, he didn't - he lead with it. > Diversity -- but no diversity of opinion... Is there any sort of evidence of action? Him having had sex with children? If anything, it's you who left out the part where Stallman already said, before this incindent, that he was wrong. I.e. he said it because he actually changed his mind and believes he was wrong, not in order to "save face" or clear his image or avoid scandal or whatnot.

CathedralBorrow 7y ago
If someone tells me they think that it's sometimes fine to have sex with children, I don't need any evidence of action to want to distance myself from that person. > If anything, it's you who left out the part where Stallman already said, before this incindent, that he was wrong. I.e. he said it because he actually changed his mind and believes he was wrong, not in order to "save face" or clear his image or avoid scandal or whatnot. He posted that after the storm had started, three days before his resignation. A few days after the "Remove Richard Stallman" Medium post was written. Do you think that's a complete coincidence? Has nothing to do with saving face and only his desire to explain that he had changed his mind?
- dzamie 7y ago
  >they think that it's sometimes fine to have sex with children From what I can tell from the snippets posted here, he isn't saying it's fine, he's saying he's seen insufficient evidence to form an opinion - and in such a state, he resists those who would force one on him with faulty reasoning. Or, to put it another way, he views morality with three responses [yes, no, I don't know], which causes friction with people who view it with two: "Is involuntary pedophilia bad?" [yes] "Is all pedophilia bad?" [idk - insufficient evidence on voluntary or its inherent lack of existence] "Do you think that all pedophilia is bad?" [no - position held is idk, not yes] "Therefore, you think all pedophilia is good." [no - position held is idk, not yes] A similar comparison might be being asked if you enjoyed an unreleased book, then using "no[, I haven't read it and formed an opinion]" to justify "you think the book is bad." ETA: also, if he hasn't said more on the subject in recent years, it's silly to assume that he necessarily still hold these views or lack thereof.

lettergram 7y ago

Please provide a link. I’ve seen this repeated, but no source. I don’t necessarily doubt it, but if you don’t provide a link your basically committing slander.

CathedralBorrow 7y ago
“I am sceptical of the claim that voluntarily pedophilia harms children. The arguments that it causes harm seem to be based on cases which aren’t voluntary, which are then stretched by parents who are horrified by the idea that their little baby is maturing.” “There is little evidence to justify the widespread assumption that willing participation in pedophilia hurts children.“ I can give you the links but it's quite easy to Google. Edit since I dug them up for another comment: https://stallman.org/archives/2006-may-aug.html#05%20June%202006%20(Dutch%20paedophiles%20form%20political%20party) https://stallman.org/archives/2006-may-aug.html#05%20June%20... https://stallman.org/archives/2012-nov-feb.html#04_January_2013_(Pedophilia) https://stallman.org/archives/2012-nov-feb.html#04_January_2...
- hizanberg 7y ago
  It's well-known he's since recanted his thoughts in those posts: https://stallman.org/archives/2019-jul-oct.html#14_September_2019_%28Sex_between_an_adult_and_a_child_is_wrong%29 https://stallman.org/archives/2019-jul-oct.html#14_September... Are people allowed to change their mind after having conversations that convince them that their position is wrong?
  - CathedralBorrow 7y ago
    Of course people are allowed to change their minds. But forgive me if I take a skeptical view of someone in their sixties suddenly saying "Contrary to my writings on the subject, I've recently learned that having sex with children is wrong" Especially if that recanting happens to take place right as the shitstorm about his writings and behavior has started.
    - 7y ago

seba_dos1 7y ago

What you call "pedophilic musings", I call natural thinking process that probably every critical thinker went through in their life. It even reaches standard socially-acceptable conclusion - it just took him way longer than usual (which frankly is hardly surprising).

CathedralBorrow 7y ago
Yeah, took him until a few days after the whole storm had started. Good timing to have such a profound reversal in your view on pedophilia.
- seba_dos1 7y ago
  So? Stallman is the last person on earth I'd suspect of opportunistic opinion changing. The whole life of this person revolves around being stubborn in his point of view regardless of what others think about it. I've seen many people suggesting that that last note is a kind of "damage control", but that's probably the least believable accusation when it comes to rms.
  - CathedralBorrow 7y ago
    That's fine, I'm just skeptical. I'm sure he'd understand.
- flukus 7y ago
  Because he probably forgot about it until then. He comments on half a dozen things a day, out of tens of thousands of comments over 2 decades only 2 were about this issue so it's not as if it was a firmly held personal conviction.
  - CathedralBorrow 7y ago
    I don't know about you, but I don't think forgetting that you believe sex with children can be fine is any better really.