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You're missing the nuance of the language as selected. "I am skeptical" clearly prefaces a desire to be made aware of actual scientific evidence, to have the c

You're missing the nuance of the language as selected. "I am skeptical" clearly prefaces a desire to be made aware of actual scientific evidence, to have the citations (references to the evidence) provided. Further, you, and others who keep beating this dead horse, do not realize that it is part of a larger, ongoing, discussion in which (IIRC from prior HN threads), RMS had that skepticism resolved with knowledge by those who actually discussed the point, rather than bashing someone for asking "is this actually true; where is the evidence?" The scientific method involves asking if assumptions are true. I can sympathize with the theory that a substantial quantity of __additional__ damage is caused by the reactions of others after such unfortunate experiences. RMS was making a supposition that might be studied. The phrasing is, as the article mentioned, rather without consideration for how others might receive such a statement.

deleted 7y ago
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d0gsg0w00f 7y ago
The facts are that these days you just can't discuss some topics "logically" in a public setting. There are forbidden topics that only have one acceptable position. For example, it's not acceptable for anyone to discuss why blackface is offensive and clowns/mimes are not.
- nepeckman 7y ago
  The blackface discussion isn't taboo, it's just been discussed to death and there's only one reasonable position. Google minstrel shows. The history of blackface is one of mocking black people. There is no way to "logically" argue that it isn't offensive because there are no facts to back up that claim.
  - tkel 7y ago
    Yeah, and often it comes from a place of skepticism, not from a place of trying to understand. And also from a place of laziness, where the skeptic expects the marginalized person to explain why the behavior or speech is harmful, and explain it in a way that is acceptable to the skeptic. All the while the understanding is a short Google search away.
    - steveeq1 7y ago
      The problem is it's selectively applied. I can just as easily argue that rap music as "harmful" and what they said were "terrible" things, and yet there is no public outrage over that. In western society, it seems, thugs are exempt from all the politically correct standards that the rest of us are expected to abide by.
      - ineedasername 7y ago
        Apart from rap just, really, really not at all being anywhere in the same ballpark, there are examples where rap music has undergone social scrutiny and changed as a result: Cop killing lyrics. I'm not saying they don't occur at all any more, but they're considered much less acceptable than in the 90's.
        steveeq1 7y ago
        sure, you can find am exception if you look hard enough. But my point being is that the outrage crowd simply doesn't apply the same level of outrage to thugs as they do everyone else in any by-and-large way.
        ineedasername 7y ago
        Maybe I've lost the line of thinking here. I thought we were talking about black face, and why people are offended by it. It's an offensive racial stereotype. I really don't see anything comparable about thugs. I'm not even clear on what you mean by thug outrage: is it that thugs exist? Is it media portrayal of thugs? Is it that thugs do or say bad things? I am honestly confused by this comparison.
        steveeq1 7y ago
        My point is that "gangsta" rap music is every bit as offensive as blackface, perhaps even more. But outrage culture selectively applies the "harmful" argument to the latter, not the former. Nor do they make as a big deal of it.
  - lawnchair_larry 7y ago
    There are many ways to logically argue this. I myself find it very confusing, and I am even a bit skeptical that people who cry racism actually understand it themselves. The Canadian PM was just in a brownface scandal for wearing dark makeup as part of an Arabian themed costume party. Canada never had minstrel shows making fun of brown people, yet this was abhorrent racism that may cost him the election, for essentially paying homage with his costume. It now seems to be the case that any white person who darkens their skin for any reason is a racist, which is obviously absurd.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
- etchalon 7y ago
  It's less that it's not acceptable and more so that it's a plainly stupid argument.
- ineedasername 7y ago
  >why blackface is offensive and clowns/mimes are not It's because one of those two things was used for over a century to convey a belittling and dehumanizing view of a group of people.
gfodor 7y ago
I’ve known people like this, and people who assume that those people are making claims when they are in fact, asking questions, are projecting. Specifically, people who are unable to take questions at face value are often people who are good at using language that is in the form of a question to give commands or state claims (typical in politics for example.) (For anyone that reading, no, my observation here is not making a claim about the justness of the treatment of RMS, if you can’t see that upon a re-read you too may be projecting.)
- DSingularity 7y ago
  What a confusing sentence. Are you saying the people who at mischaracterizing observations as claims are doing so because they are projecting their own positions?
  - gfodor 7y ago
    No, I'm saying that they themselves use questions as a way to direct or claim, and so, when they encounter a person asking a question that could be interpreted in that way, they project their own behavior onto that person even if the person has no ulterior purpose to the question. For example, "Do you think we should fix this bug?" can be a directive from your boss to fix the bug if they are this kind of person. If you respond "I'm not sure, is it related to work I did?" could be interpreted as a claim that it's not related to work you did, vs an actual question. The best way to deal with this kind of thing if you are the questioner is to try to craft questions in a way that they are not able to be re-framed as non-questions, but its challenging to do so on the fly.
unityByFreedom 7y ago
> RMS had that skepticism resolved with knowledge by those who actually discussed the point Then he should directly comment on all of the statements on the subject he has made over the years [1], particularly since they still exist on his personal website in unedited form, and are easily linked. Honestly, he could easily go back and write an "Updated: I no longer think this because X. I held this idea for a long time because Y." He hasn't done that. He's free not to do so if he chooses, though I think this is one of the things he needs to shore up if he is to recover his reputation. I had no knowledge of these quotes prior to this incident, and while I still support free software, I will look to other folks for leadership on the topic. [1] https://www.google.com/search?q=pedophile+site%3Astallman.org https://www.google.com/search?q=pedophile+site%3Astallman.or...
- kragen 7y ago
  He did do that, in fact. He just didn't do it in the specific place you're looking.
dependenttypes 7y ago
In addition to that, this quote had a link to https://www.theguardian.com/society/2013/jan/03/paedophilia-bringing-dark-desires-light https://www.theguardian.com/society/2013/jan/03/paedophilia-...
DanBC 7y ago
> RMS had that skepticism resolved with knowledge by those who actually discussed the point, Except he keeps making the same point. He has not changed his mind about images of child sexual abuse. He now knows that these cause harm to the people shown in them, but he thinks censorship is worse than that harm. And you're entirely missing the point. It doesn't matter if he has changed his mind. He must know that child abuse is an emotive topic. He must understand that the emotion imposes an extra responsibility to be careful with the way he says things. His point - that he isn't sure if child abuse is harmful or not - was very easy to find information about. There's a wide range of reputable sources that discuss the harms caused by images of child sexual abuse and by child abuse. Mostly, we have testimony from the abuse people themselves. This stuff is not hidden away, and it appears to have been persuasive to him. So he just didn't bother looking before he made his comments.

deleted 7y ago

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d0gsg0w00f 7y ago

The facts are that these days you just can't discuss some topics "logically" in a public setting. There are forbidden topics that only have one acceptable position. For example, it's not acceptable for anyone to discuss why blackface is offensive and clowns/mimes are not.

nepeckman 7y ago
The blackface discussion isn't taboo, it's just been discussed to death and there's only one reasonable position. Google minstrel shows. The history of blackface is one of mocking black people. There is no way to "logically" argue that it isn't offensive because there are no facts to back up that claim.
- tkel 7y ago
  Yeah, and often it comes from a place of skepticism, not from a place of trying to understand. And also from a place of laziness, where the skeptic expects the marginalized person to explain why the behavior or speech is harmful, and explain it in a way that is acceptable to the skeptic. All the while the understanding is a short Google search away.
  - steveeq1 7y ago
    The problem is it's selectively applied. I can just as easily argue that rap music as "harmful" and what they said were "terrible" things, and yet there is no public outrage over that. In western society, it seems, thugs are exempt from all the politically correct standards that the rest of us are expected to abide by.
    - ineedasername 7y ago
      Apart from rap just, really, really not at all being anywhere in the same ballpark, there are examples where rap music has undergone social scrutiny and changed as a result: Cop killing lyrics. I'm not saying they don't occur at all any more, but they're considered much less acceptable than in the 90's.
      - steveeq1 7y ago
        sure, you can find am exception if you look hard enough. But my point being is that the outrage crowd simply doesn't apply the same level of outrage to thugs as they do everyone else in any by-and-large way.
        ineedasername 7y ago
        Maybe I've lost the line of thinking here. I thought we were talking about black face, and why people are offended by it. It's an offensive racial stereotype. I really don't see anything comparable about thugs. I'm not even clear on what you mean by thug outrage: is it that thugs exist? Is it media portrayal of thugs? Is it that thugs do or say bad things? I am honestly confused by this comparison.
        steveeq1 7y ago
        My point is that "gangsta" rap music is every bit as offensive as blackface, perhaps even more. But outrage culture selectively applies the "harmful" argument to the latter, not the former. Nor do they make as a big deal of it.
- lawnchair_larry 7y ago
  There are many ways to logically argue this. I myself find it very confusing, and I am even a bit skeptical that people who cry racism actually understand it themselves. The Canadian PM was just in a brownface scandal for wearing dark makeup as part of an Arabian themed costume party. Canada never had minstrel shows making fun of brown people, yet this was abhorrent racism that may cost him the election, for essentially paying homage with his costume. It now seems to be the case that any white person who darkens their skin for any reason is a racist, which is obviously absurd.
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
etchalon 7y ago
It's less that it's not acceptable and more so that it's a plainly stupid argument.
ineedasername 7y ago
>why blackface is offensive and clowns/mimes are not It's because one of those two things was used for over a century to convey a belittling and dehumanizing view of a group of people.

gfodor 7y ago

I’ve known people like this, and people who assume that those people are making claims when they are in fact, asking questions, are projecting. Specifically, people who are unable to take questions at face value are often people who are good at using language that is in the form of a question to give commands or state claims (typical in politics for example.) (For anyone that reading, no, my observation here is not making a claim about the justness of the treatment of RMS, if you can’t see that upon a re-read you too may be projecting.)

DSingularity 7y ago
What a confusing sentence. Are you saying the people who at mischaracterizing observations as claims are doing so because they are projecting their own positions?
- gfodor 7y ago
  No, I'm saying that they themselves use questions as a way to direct or claim, and so, when they encounter a person asking a question that could be interpreted in that way, they project their own behavior onto that person even if the person has no ulterior purpose to the question. For example, "Do you think we should fix this bug?" can be a directive from your boss to fix the bug if they are this kind of person. If you respond "I'm not sure, is it related to work I did?" could be interpreted as a claim that it's not related to work you did, vs an actual question. The best way to deal with this kind of thing if you are the questioner is to try to craft questions in a way that they are not able to be re-framed as non-questions, but its challenging to do so on the fly.

unityByFreedom 7y ago

> RMS had that skepticism resolved with knowledge by those who actually discussed the point Then he should directly comment on all of the statements on the subject he has made over the years [1], particularly since they still exist on his personal website in unedited form, and are easily linked. Honestly, he could easily go back and write an "Updated: I no longer think this because X. I held this idea for a long time because Y." He hasn't done that. He's free not to do so if he chooses, though I think this is one of the things he needs to shore up if he is to recover his reputation. I had no knowledge of these quotes prior to this incident, and while I still support free software, I will look to other folks for leadership on the topic. [1] https://www.google.com/search?q=pedophile+site%3Astallman.org https://www.google.com/search?q=pedophile+site%3Astallman.or...

kragen 7y ago
He did do that, in fact. He just didn't do it in the specific place you're looking.

dependenttypes 7y ago

In addition to that, this quote had a link to https://www.theguardian.com/society/2013/jan/03/paedophilia-bringing-dark-desires-light https://www.theguardian.com/society/2013/jan/03/paedophilia-...

DanBC 7y ago

> RMS had that skepticism resolved with knowledge by those who actually discussed the point, Except he keeps making the same point. He has not changed his mind about images of child sexual abuse. He now knows that these cause harm to the people shown in them, but he thinks censorship is worse than that harm. And you're entirely missing the point. It doesn't matter if he has changed his mind. He must know that child abuse is an emotive topic. He must understand that the emotion imposes an extra responsibility to be careful with the way he says things. His point - that he isn't sure if child abuse is harmful or not - was very easy to find information about. There's a wide range of reputable sources that discuss the harms caused by images of child sexual abuse and by child abuse. Mostly, we have testimony from the abuse people themselves. This stuff is not hidden away, and it appears to have been persuasive to him. So he just didn't bother looking before he made his comments.