5 ms·

Unbelievable... so autism is now a treatable disease? Is LGBTQ++ also treatable according to you? Your comment is bigotted nonesense across the whole gamut.

orra 6y ago
> autism is now a treatable disease? I didn't say cure. But there are therapies for autism: therapy, for a start. > Is LGBTQ++ also treatable according to you? That's a crass straw man. Being LGBT+ is not a disorder. Indeed, being trans was recently removed as a disorder from DSM.
- geofft 6y ago
  Perhaps a better way of putting this is that while autism doesn't need a "cure," being an asshole is absolutely a thing that - if it is indeed caused by a medical condition - a medical professional can help with. (And if it is not caused by a medical condition, then it is simply a character flaw, and should be judged like a willful character flaw and not like a medical condition.) There are plenty of autistic people who are not assholes and are lovely people. Many of them say they go out of their way to have their rational brain compensate for the level of emotional processing that other people expect out of them, that they specifically worry about being perceived as rude. The least a leader of an activism organization can do (assuming he does in fact care about the activism) is to figure out when he's alienating people and figure out how to stop, or to step down and let someone else take the leadership role.
  - yellowapple 6y ago
    > The least a leader of an activism organization can do (assuming he does in fact care about the activism) is to figure out when he's alienating people and figure out how to stop, or to step down and let someone else take the leadership role. Which he did, and pretty quickly at that. And then the FSF evidently wanted him to return, hence his reappointment to the Board of Directors.
  - MauranKilom 6y ago
    > figure out when he's alienating people and figure out how to stop I read through the appendix in the open letter and find no discussion of this. If he did stop, would you agree that this entire letter was baseless?
    - geofft 6y ago
      I personally find the open letter a bit short on these sorts of details. I think better sources are these: http://ebb.org/bkuhn/blog/2019/10/15/fsf-rms.html http://ebb.org/bkuhn/blog/2019/10/15/fsf-rms.html (October 2019, by a former FSF board member and 2021 recipient of the FSF's Award for the Advancement of Free Software): > For the last two years, I had been a loud internal voice in the FSF leadership regarding RMS' Free-Software-unrelated public statements; I felt strongly that it was in the best interest of the FSF to actively seek to limit such statements, and that it was my duty to FSF to speak out about this within the organization. [...] When the escalation started, I still considered RMS both a friend and colleague, and I attempted to argue with him at length to convince him that some of his positions were harmful to sexual assault survivors and those who are sex-trafficked, and to the people who devote their lives in service to such individuals. More importantly to the FSF, I attempted to persuade RMS that launching a controversial campaign on sexual behavior and morality was counter to his and FSF's mission to advance software freedom, and told RMS that my duty as an FSF Director was to assure the best outcome for the FSF, which IMO didn't include having a leader who made such statements. https://mjg59.dreamwidth.org/52587.html https://mjg59.dreamwidth.org/52587.html (September 2019, by a former FSF board member and 2014 recipient of the FSF's Award for the Advancement of Free Software): > I've spent a lot of time working with him to help him understand why various positions he holds are harmful. I've reached the conclusion that it's not that he's unable to understand, he's just unwilling to change his mind. They aren't going to change the letter or its appendix at this point, given that people have signed, but if I had the magic power to change it, I would suggest those two as citations that he was repeatedly asked to consider the impact of his actions and repeatedly refused. If he did stop - if he did express the interest in figuring out why he's alienating people and why his statements were not only hurting the cause of free software directly but wasting the time of FSF board members who could be contributing to free software instead - then yes, the letter would have been unnecessary, because the problem would have been resolved.
- yellowapple 6y ago
  > That's a crass straw man. Being LGBT+ is not a disorder. Indeed, being trans was recently removed as a disorder from DSM. And who's to say the same won't eventually be said of autism spectrum disorder, or social communication disorder? Like you say, being homosexual or dysphoric was a "disorder" until it wasn't. That is: it's hardly a strawman to draw comparisons between how homosexuality / transgender identity was historically regarded v. how neuroatypical personality traits are regarded now.

orra 6y ago

> autism is now a treatable disease? I didn't say cure. But there are therapies for autism: therapy, for a start. > Is LGBTQ++ also treatable according to you? That's a crass straw man. Being LGBT+ is not a disorder. Indeed, being trans was recently removed as a disorder from DSM.

geofft 6y ago
Perhaps a better way of putting this is that while autism doesn't need a "cure," being an asshole is absolutely a thing that - if it is indeed caused by a medical condition - a medical professional can help with. (And if it is not caused by a medical condition, then it is simply a character flaw, and should be judged like a willful character flaw and not like a medical condition.) There are plenty of autistic people who are not assholes and are lovely people. Many of them say they go out of their way to have their rational brain compensate for the level of emotional processing that other people expect out of them, that they specifically worry about being perceived as rude. The least a leader of an activism organization can do (assuming he does in fact care about the activism) is to figure out when he's alienating people and figure out how to stop, or to step down and let someone else take the leadership role.
- yellowapple 6y ago
  > The least a leader of an activism organization can do (assuming he does in fact care about the activism) is to figure out when he's alienating people and figure out how to stop, or to step down and let someone else take the leadership role. Which he did, and pretty quickly at that. And then the FSF evidently wanted him to return, hence his reappointment to the Board of Directors.
- MauranKilom 6y ago
  > figure out when he's alienating people and figure out how to stop I read through the appendix in the open letter and find no discussion of this. If he did stop, would you agree that this entire letter was baseless?
  - geofft 6y ago
    I personally find the open letter a bit short on these sorts of details. I think better sources are these: http://ebb.org/bkuhn/blog/2019/10/15/fsf-rms.html http://ebb.org/bkuhn/blog/2019/10/15/fsf-rms.html (October 2019, by a former FSF board member and 2021 recipient of the FSF's Award for the Advancement of Free Software): > For the last two years, I had been a loud internal voice in the FSF leadership regarding RMS' Free-Software-unrelated public statements; I felt strongly that it was in the best interest of the FSF to actively seek to limit such statements, and that it was my duty to FSF to speak out about this within the organization. [...] When the escalation started, I still considered RMS both a friend and colleague, and I attempted to argue with him at length to convince him that some of his positions were harmful to sexual assault survivors and those who are sex-trafficked, and to the people who devote their lives in service to such individuals. More importantly to the FSF, I attempted to persuade RMS that launching a controversial campaign on sexual behavior and morality was counter to his and FSF's mission to advance software freedom, and told RMS that my duty as an FSF Director was to assure the best outcome for the FSF, which IMO didn't include having a leader who made such statements. https://mjg59.dreamwidth.org/52587.html https://mjg59.dreamwidth.org/52587.html (September 2019, by a former FSF board member and 2014 recipient of the FSF's Award for the Advancement of Free Software): > I've spent a lot of time working with him to help him understand why various positions he holds are harmful. I've reached the conclusion that it's not that he's unable to understand, he's just unwilling to change his mind. They aren't going to change the letter or its appendix at this point, given that people have signed, but if I had the magic power to change it, I would suggest those two as citations that he was repeatedly asked to consider the impact of his actions and repeatedly refused. If he did stop - if he did express the interest in figuring out why he's alienating people and why his statements were not only hurting the cause of free software directly but wasting the time of FSF board members who could be contributing to free software instead - then yes, the letter would have been unnecessary, because the problem would have been resolved.
yellowapple 6y ago
> That's a crass straw man. Being LGBT+ is not a disorder. Indeed, being trans was recently removed as a disorder from DSM. And who's to say the same won't eventually be said of autism spectrum disorder, or social communication disorder? Like you say, being homosexual or dysphoric was a "disorder" until it wasn't. That is: it's hardly a strawman to draw comparisons between how homosexuality / transgender identity was historically regarded v. how neuroatypical personality traits are regarded now.