5 ms·

Can we please stop armchair-diagnosing RMS and excusing his behaviour based on this armchair diagnosis? Or even worse, calling it a disability like Bruce Perens

Can we please stop armchair-diagnosing RMS and excusing his behaviour based on this armchair diagnosis? Or even worse, calling it a disability like Bruce Perens does, in some kind of effort to gain sympathy, or perhaps appeal to ADA? First of all, nobody has ever actually diagnosed RMS and he himself has rejected that folk diagnosis when offered to him. If dude wanted psychiatric help, he could get it. Second of all, the diagnosis, if it were accurate, is no excuse. Lots of people on the spectrum know how to behave. Finally, even if was autistic and even if we could excuse his behaviour by his autism, he's not fit to be in any kind of leadership position. Yelling at people when they use the wrong words, which is his main and constant strategy, does not help the cause of free software. Technological self-abnegation, while giving him an aura of sainthood, does little to actually put free software in the hands of users. Stallman can keep blogging if he wants, he can keep up his self-abnegation, but he doesn't have to be in the decision board of the FSF to do this.

warkdarrior 6y ago
You are probably referring to ADA not DACA, unless you think RMS is about to be deported.
- jordigh 6y ago
  Thank you, fixed.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
bryanrasmussen 6y ago
>If dude wanted psychiatric help, he could get it. Just to touch on this and not the other issues - many people who are diagnosable as having some problem refuse diagnosis, this does not mean they don't have the problem they could be diagnosed as having.
wahern 6y ago
> Yelling at people when they use the wrong words, which is his main and constant strategy, does not help the cause of free software. Arguably the reason you're using the term "free software" is because of RMS' incessant chastising. The only thing as relentless as RMS are the forces that continually eat away at the central thesis of his movement--the necessity for users to have access to the source code of the software they use as requisite for software freedom. Does the movement need RMS going forward? I don't know. I'm not even sure it can stay as strong as it is, regardless of his participation. I have more certainty, however, that it wouldn't be as successful as it was and currently is without him. His conflation of the utilitarian and political character of software was rather unique. Even today the vast majority of people find the comparison either impractical, trite, or otherwise inapposite. Comparable concepts, like Lessig's "code is law", aren't quite the same and in any event haven't had the staying power.
torthrowaway998 6y ago
>Lots of people on the spectrum know how to behave. It is called a spectrum because it contains a lot of different conditions that vary significantly. >but he doesn't have to be in the decision board of the FSF to do this Please re-evaluate this statement. One could as well use "you don't have to be in the decision board of the FSF to be gay". He certainly does not need to be in the decision board of the FSF to do this but you do not need to be in the decision board of the FSF to do pretty much anything. I would argue that being in the decision board (instead of being the president) of the FSF is a good position for him. He can continue steering the FSF on things regarding software freedom, can continue giving his talks, and the face of the FSF will be someone who is more desirable by donors and deals with people better I guess?

warkdarrior 6y ago

You are probably referring to ADA not DACA, unless you think RMS is about to be deported.

jordigh 6y ago
Thank you, fixed.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

bryanrasmussen 6y ago

>If dude wanted psychiatric help, he could get it. Just to touch on this and not the other issues - many people who are diagnosable as having some problem refuse diagnosis, this does not mean they don't have the problem they could be diagnosed as having.

wahern 6y ago

> Yelling at people when they use the wrong words, which is his main and constant strategy, does not help the cause of free software. Arguably the reason you're using the term "free software" is because of RMS' incessant chastising. The only thing as relentless as RMS are the forces that continually eat away at the central thesis of his movement--the necessity for users to have access to the source code of the software they use as requisite for software freedom. Does the movement need RMS going forward? I don't know. I'm not even sure it can stay as strong as it is, regardless of his participation. I have more certainty, however, that it wouldn't be as successful as it was and currently is without him. His conflation of the utilitarian and political character of software was rather unique. Even today the vast majority of people find the comparison either impractical, trite, or otherwise inapposite. Comparable concepts, like Lessig's "code is law", aren't quite the same and in any event haven't had the staying power.

torthrowaway998 6y ago

>Lots of people on the spectrum know how to behave. It is called a spectrum because it contains a lot of different conditions that vary significantly. >but he doesn't have to be in the decision board of the FSF to do this Please re-evaluate this statement. One could as well use "you don't have to be in the decision board of the FSF to be gay". He certainly does not need to be in the decision board of the FSF to do this but you do not need to be in the decision board of the FSF to do pretty much anything. I would argue that being in the decision board (instead of being the president) of the FSF is a good position for him. He can continue steering the FSF on things regarding software freedom, can continue giving his talks, and the face of the FSF will be someone who is more desirable by donors and deals with people better I guess?