8 ms·

The attacks on him were dubious at best.

deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
bigtones 6y ago
Are they.... here is a direct quote from him on a pro-pedophilia political party in 2006 that many that people took offence with: “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.” https://thenextweb.com/dd/2019/09/13/free-software-icon-richard-stallman-has-some-moronic-thoughts-about-pedophilia/amp/ https://thenextweb.com/dd/2019/09/13/free-software-icon-rich...
- hn8788 6y ago
  When taken out of context it looks bad, but when it's part of a broader discussion about morality and law not always matching up, it makes sense. Age of consent laws vary around the world, and it doesn't make sense why someone could legally have consensual sex with someone in one country, but if they had sex in a place with different age of consent laws, they'd be branded a pedophile.
  - pseudalopex 6y ago
    It wasn't part of a broader discussion.[1] And he wasn't talking about adolescents.[2] [1] https://stallman.org/archives/2006-mar-jun.html#05%20June%202006%20(Dutch%20paedophiles%20form%20political%20party) https://stallman.org/archives/2006-mar-jun.html#05%20June%20... [2] https://stallman.org/notes/2019-jan-apr.html#25_April_2019_(Plea_deal_for_Epstein) https://stallman.org/notes/2019-jan-apr.html#25_April_2019_(...
  - phpnode 6y ago
    This is an example where the quote is actually worse with the broader context.
- bpodgursky 6y ago
  This is not something I would say, or something I would ever recommend someone say, but it is 100% the type of open questioning an autism-spectrum person would ask when they don't understand the emotional weight or implications behind asking such a question.
- cambalache 6y ago
  Was he being an actual child-predator, was he sharing child porn? Suppose some guy (Stallman or not) argues that the age of consent should be lowered to 14. Now you are in your right to oppose to that proposal or even be disgusted by it. What you dont have the right to is to silence and ostracize the guy or even suggest that opinion must have any type of consequence , be it legal or moral.
  - ramraj07 6y ago
    I have the right to attempt to silence or ostracise anyone for anything. Whether or not it’s successful depends on the situation and climate of the world at that time. He has the right to say whatever he wants to say as well. He wasn’t jailed for it just fired for it. Ask him to suck it up and then everyone here can also do the same thing instead of crying a river. Also, please try to show a single example of a person who defended pedophilia and ended up not being one? Discussing age of consent with respect to reducing it below 18 sounds like tacit support of the same. Many countries have lower ages, sure, but its not clear to me that this is because they were morally thought through decisions, mere figments of history that people cling to in the name of culture (also many of the decision makers seem happy to have the freedom to have sex with 14 year olds as well I suppose).
    - JarlUlvi 6y ago
      You don't need a high IQ to look at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_age_of_consent https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_age_of_co... and understand there are huge definitional problems of defining pedophilia. > Also, please try to show a single example of a person who defended pedophilia and ended up not being one? You've managed to stuff many logical fallacies into a fairly short statement. Bravo!
    - gruez 6y ago
      > I have the right to attempt to silence or ostracise anyone for anything. Whether or not it’s successful depends on the situation and climate of the world at that time. Well, not really. If you try to ostracize someone for being black you'll quickly face legal and/or social sanctions. >Also, please try to show a single example of a person who defended pedophilia and ended up not being one? Does expressing skepticism of the scientific basis behind anti-pedophilia laws constitute "defending" pedophilia? Furthermore, if the argument is valid, who cares who's mouth it's coming from? This looks like a lazy attempt to dismiss someone's argument.
- konjin 6y ago
  Odd that none of the teens Epstein slept with would be illegal to sleep with in Germany. Pedophilia is starting to mean 'sex I find icky' in the US.
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
  - buisi 6y ago
    German Law is a bit more complicated than people give it credit for. While the police might not proactively go after cases involving some older minors, they will if the person files a complaint. If a situation involves "exploitation" under the law, as most of Epstein's crimes would be considered to, then it is also automatically illegal.
    - konjin 6y ago
      Yes, rape is a bad thing that gets reported in other countries too.
- lawnchair_larry 6y ago
  Sounds like he is trying to follow the science. Aren’t we all about that nowadays? His statement is perfectly reasonable. Also, it’s extremely dishonest of you, and frankly a little contemptible, to keep smearing a man by taking this out of context and failing to also mention where he learned more about the issue and changed his views. This serves no other purpose than character assassination.
- r3856283 6y ago
  But after someone read it they spoke to him about it and he realized he was wrong and published a correction right along side it and that was many years ago. You should have mentioned that. If he hadn't said it publicly, and only said it in private to people, that wouldn't have happened. Is that better? I don't think so. Free speech creates counter speech and changes people's minds.
  - pseudalopex 6y ago
    He didn't retract anything until just before he resigned as far as I know.[1] The retraction wasn't right along side his earlier comments.[2][3] 6 years isn't many at his age. And he fixed a link without changing anything else just 1 year before. Defend him if you want. But let's be accurate. [1] https://stallman.org/archives/2019-jul-oct.html#14_September_2019_(Sex_between_an_adult_and_a_child_is_wrong) https://stallman.org/archives/2019-jul-oct.html#14_September... [2] https://stallman.org/archives/2006-mar-jun.html#05%20June%202006%20(Dutch%20paedophiles%20form%20political%20party) https://stallman.org/archives/2006-mar-jun.html#05%20June%20... [3] https://stallman.org/archives/2012-nov-feb.html#04_January_2013_(Pedophilia) https://stallman.org/archives/2012-nov-feb.html#04_January_2...
    - CRConrad 6y ago
      Someone far above posted an archive.org link from, was it 2006?, that allegedly showed him already having changed his mind on something by then. AFAICR from the discussion it was either exactly what you're talking about or something very similar. (Sorry, you're on your own looking for it -- it was on the first page at the time I saw it.)
- wsc981 6y ago
  I think this view of Stallman was quite widespread in the 70s, or at the very least much more widespread than it is today. I read in The Netherlands in the 70s child porn was quite readily available. See also “Chick arrest”: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Child_pornography_laws_in_the_Netherlands https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Child_pornography_laws_in_th... In this period there were even politicians openly advocating for allowing sex with children on television: https://youtu.be/nSMpAhQRDB8 https://youtu.be/nSMpAhQRDB8 (Dutch spoken) It seems to me often the people advocating for allowing sex with children would be left-oriented. https://timeline.com/children-of-god-5245a45f6a2a https://timeline.com/children-of-god-5245a45f6a2a However I believe most decent human beings these days realize sex with children can be very harmful to children. Perhaps this is a background Stallman grew up in.
  - rayiner 6y ago
    > It seems to me often the people advocating for allowing sex with children would be left-oriented. And teenagers. My kid's progressive K-12 private school had a scandal recently when more than a dozen victims came forth with allegations that they had been sexually abused by male teachers in the 1970s. Much of the testimony recounts that sexual relationships between male teachers and high school students were an "open secret" around the school, teachers would invite students to parties at their houses, etc. It was a very liberal school back then too--the fact that it did not generate a scandal at the time despite being an "open secret" tells you about how the boundaries were being pushed in various directions back then. Luckily that turned out to be an ideological dead end.
dang 6y ago
Unrelated to the topic, but could you please stop creating accounts for every few comments you post? We ban accounts that do that. This is in the site guidelines: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html. You needn't use your real name, of course, but for HN to be a community, users need some identity for other users to relate to. Otherwise we may as well have no usernames and no community, and that would be a different kind of forum. https://hn.algolia.com/?query=community%20identity%20by:dang&sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comment&storyText=false&prefix&page=0 https://hn.algolia.com/?query=community%20identity%20by:dang...
- fsflover 6y ago
  Technically, such guideline prohibits anonymous speech, because how you speak can reveal your identity after a certain threshold...
  - dang 6y ago
    These are all questions of degree and how to balance trade-offs, so while you've raised one legitimate concern (among the many), I don't think an absolute statement like "prohibits anonymous speech" is accurate.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

Are they.... here is a direct quote from him on a pro-pedophilia political party in 2006 that many that people took offence with: “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.” https://thenextweb.com/dd/2019/09/13/free-software-icon-richard-stallman-has-some-moronic-thoughts-about-pedophilia/amp/ https://thenextweb.com/dd/2019/09/13/free-software-icon-rich...

hn8788 6y ago
When taken out of context it looks bad, but when it's part of a broader discussion about morality and law not always matching up, it makes sense. Age of consent laws vary around the world, and it doesn't make sense why someone could legally have consensual sex with someone in one country, but if they had sex in a place with different age of consent laws, they'd be branded a pedophile.
- pseudalopex 6y ago
  It wasn't part of a broader discussion.[1] And he wasn't talking about adolescents.[2] [1] https://stallman.org/archives/2006-mar-jun.html#05%20June%202006%20(Dutch%20paedophiles%20form%20political%20party) https://stallman.org/archives/2006-mar-jun.html#05%20June%20... [2] https://stallman.org/notes/2019-jan-apr.html#25_April_2019_(Plea_deal_for_Epstein) https://stallman.org/notes/2019-jan-apr.html#25_April_2019_(...
- phpnode 6y ago
  This is an example where the quote is actually worse with the broader context.
bpodgursky 6y ago
This is not something I would say, or something I would ever recommend someone say, but it is 100% the type of open questioning an autism-spectrum person would ask when they don't understand the emotional weight or implications behind asking such a question.
cambalache 6y ago
Was he being an actual child-predator, was he sharing child porn? Suppose some guy (Stallman or not) argues that the age of consent should be lowered to 14. Now you are in your right to oppose to that proposal or even be disgusted by it. What you dont have the right to is to silence and ostracize the guy or even suggest that opinion must have any type of consequence , be it legal or moral.
- ramraj07 6y ago
  I have the right to attempt to silence or ostracise anyone for anything. Whether or not it’s successful depends on the situation and climate of the world at that time. He has the right to say whatever he wants to say as well. He wasn’t jailed for it just fired for it. Ask him to suck it up and then everyone here can also do the same thing instead of crying a river. Also, please try to show a single example of a person who defended pedophilia and ended up not being one? Discussing age of consent with respect to reducing it below 18 sounds like tacit support of the same. Many countries have lower ages, sure, but its not clear to me that this is because they were morally thought through decisions, mere figments of history that people cling to in the name of culture (also many of the decision makers seem happy to have the freedom to have sex with 14 year olds as well I suppose).
  - JarlUlvi 6y ago
    You don't need a high IQ to look at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_age_of_consent https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_age_of_co... and understand there are huge definitional problems of defining pedophilia. > Also, please try to show a single example of a person who defended pedophilia and ended up not being one? You've managed to stuff many logical fallacies into a fairly short statement. Bravo!
  - gruez 6y ago
    > I have the right to attempt to silence or ostracise anyone for anything. Whether or not it’s successful depends on the situation and climate of the world at that time. Well, not really. If you try to ostracize someone for being black you'll quickly face legal and/or social sanctions. >Also, please try to show a single example of a person who defended pedophilia and ended up not being one? Does expressing skepticism of the scientific basis behind anti-pedophilia laws constitute "defending" pedophilia? Furthermore, if the argument is valid, who cares who's mouth it's coming from? This looks like a lazy attempt to dismiss someone's argument.
konjin 6y ago
Odd that none of the teens Epstein slept with would be illegal to sleep with in Germany. Pedophilia is starting to mean 'sex I find icky' in the US.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- buisi 6y ago
  German Law is a bit more complicated than people give it credit for. While the police might not proactively go after cases involving some older minors, they will if the person files a complaint. If a situation involves "exploitation" under the law, as most of Epstein's crimes would be considered to, then it is also automatically illegal.
  - konjin 6y ago
    Yes, rape is a bad thing that gets reported in other countries too.
lawnchair_larry 6y ago
Sounds like he is trying to follow the science. Aren’t we all about that nowadays? His statement is perfectly reasonable. Also, it’s extremely dishonest of you, and frankly a little contemptible, to keep smearing a man by taking this out of context and failing to also mention where he learned more about the issue and changed his views. This serves no other purpose than character assassination.
r3856283 6y ago
But after someone read it they spoke to him about it and he realized he was wrong and published a correction right along side it and that was many years ago. You should have mentioned that. If he hadn't said it publicly, and only said it in private to people, that wouldn't have happened. Is that better? I don't think so. Free speech creates counter speech and changes people's minds.
- pseudalopex 6y ago
  He didn't retract anything until just before he resigned as far as I know.[1] The retraction wasn't right along side his earlier comments.[2][3] 6 years isn't many at his age. And he fixed a link without changing anything else just 1 year before. Defend him if you want. But let's be accurate. [1] https://stallman.org/archives/2019-jul-oct.html#14_September_2019_(Sex_between_an_adult_and_a_child_is_wrong) https://stallman.org/archives/2019-jul-oct.html#14_September... [2] https://stallman.org/archives/2006-mar-jun.html#05%20June%202006%20(Dutch%20paedophiles%20form%20political%20party) https://stallman.org/archives/2006-mar-jun.html#05%20June%20... [3] https://stallman.org/archives/2012-nov-feb.html#04_January_2013_(Pedophilia) https://stallman.org/archives/2012-nov-feb.html#04_January_2...
  - CRConrad 6y ago
    Someone far above posted an archive.org link from, was it 2006?, that allegedly showed him already having changed his mind on something by then. AFAICR from the discussion it was either exactly what you're talking about or something very similar. (Sorry, you're on your own looking for it -- it was on the first page at the time I saw it.)
wsc981 6y ago
I think this view of Stallman was quite widespread in the 70s, or at the very least much more widespread than it is today. I read in The Netherlands in the 70s child porn was quite readily available. See also “Chick arrest”: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Child_pornography_laws_in_the_Netherlands https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Child_pornography_laws_in_th... In this period there were even politicians openly advocating for allowing sex with children on television: https://youtu.be/nSMpAhQRDB8 https://youtu.be/nSMpAhQRDB8 (Dutch spoken) It seems to me often the people advocating for allowing sex with children would be left-oriented. https://timeline.com/children-of-god-5245a45f6a2a https://timeline.com/children-of-god-5245a45f6a2a However I believe most decent human beings these days realize sex with children can be very harmful to children. Perhaps this is a background Stallman grew up in.
- rayiner 6y ago
  > It seems to me often the people advocating for allowing sex with children would be left-oriented. And teenagers. My kid's progressive K-12 private school had a scandal recently when more than a dozen victims came forth with allegations that they had been sexually abused by male teachers in the 1970s. Much of the testimony recounts that sexual relationships between male teachers and high school students were an "open secret" around the school, teachers would invite students to parties at their houses, etc. It was a very liberal school back then too--the fact that it did not generate a scandal at the time despite being an "open secret" tells you about how the boundaries were being pushed in various directions back then. Luckily that turned out to be an ideological dead end.

dang 6y ago

Unrelated to the topic, but could you please stop creating accounts for every few comments you post? We ban accounts that do that. This is in the site guidelines: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html. You needn't use your real name, of course, but for HN to be a community, users need some identity for other users to relate to. Otherwise we may as well have no usernames and no community, and that would be a different kind of forum. https://hn.algolia.com/?query=community%20identity%20by:dang&sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comment&storyText=false&prefix&page=0 https://hn.algolia.com/?query=community%20identity%20by:dang...

fsflover 6y ago
Technically, such guideline prohibits anonymous speech, because how you speak can reveal your identity after a certain threshold...
- dang 6y ago
  These are all questions of degree and how to balance trade-offs, so while you've raised one legitimate concern (among the many), I don't think an absolute statement like "prohibits anonymous speech" is accurate.