7 ms·

> also this is from 2016, which is why recent events were not even hinted at. Wasn't the cancel Stallman movement pretty much... an anonymous blog post and not

> also this is from 2016, which is why recent events were not even hinted at. Wasn't the cancel Stallman movement pretty much... an anonymous blog post and nothing else?

bitwize 5y ago
It was decades of stories and complaints from women about his bad behavior, as well as men who have worked closely with him and covered for him during that time. Now the bill has come due, and no one will cover for him because he hasn't learned. The best thing anyone can do for him is to let him face the consequences he brought upon himself.
- 908B64B197 5y ago
  Other than this anonymous blog post https://selamjie.medium.com/remove-richard-stallman-fec6ec210794 https://selamjie.medium.com/remove-richard-stallman-fec6ec21... and some comments he made on a mailing list that were completely twisted, what exactly did he do wrong?
  - geofft 5y ago
    Well, hold up, let's clarify what's meant by "do wrong." A lot of people deeply involved with the free software and open source movement(s), including people who worked at the FSF, had been unhappy with him as a leader for a long time. https://wingolog.org/archives/2019/10/08/thoughts-on-rms-and-gnu https://wingolog.org/archives/2019/10/08/thoughts-on-rms-and... (GNU project maintainer, summarizing - with links - views of other GNU maintainners) and http://ebb.org/bkuhn/blog/2019/10/15/fsf-rms.html http://ebb.org/bkuhn/blog/2019/10/15/fsf-rms.html (long-time FSF staff, Conservancy cofounder, and 2021 FSF awardee) are good places to start reading. Or see how FSF staff unionized (unusually for tech!) to protect themselves from him (https://twitter.com/paulnivin/status/1374532930400227328 https://twitter.com/paulnivin/status/1374532930400227328 , https://twitter.com/NovalisDMT/status/1172573166956437505 https://twitter.com/NovalisDMT/status/1172573166956437505). It's true that that blog post (which was not anonymous, there's a name on it???) is what catalyzed something to actually happen, and you can dispute whether the blog post by itself merited anything. And - largely because these were things that a small group of people were trying to handle internally (did you know that the FSF staff are unionized?) - there didn't seem to be much public discussion beyond that one blog post. The GNU maintainers' mailing list is private, the discussions between FSF board members are private, etc. So, it certainly looked to the casual observer like it was a single blog post. But that wasn't the reality.
    - redis_mlc 5y ago
      You know, I read the various anti-rms links 6 months ago and saw nothing convincing, and I still don't today. The wingo link is vague and mostly drivel: bkuhn's link has disingenuous statements. Why does an article primarily about rms have references to Epstein and MIT? How clumsy is that? I'd describe both links as nothing more than ad hominem character assassinations. I'd even go so far as to say they're written to inflate the status of the author (ie. "I know him, but I'm not like him."), not deal with an actual problems beyond "I don't like his style." Major contributors to our society deserve better than essentially publicly-hosted gossip.
  - nomdep 5y ago
    Being an autistic man /s
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - fenomas 5y ago
    > this anonymous blog post https://selamjie.medium.com https://selamjie.medium.com The author's name is right there in the URL.
    - 908B64B197 5y ago
      But there's no first hand accounts of anything. It's all anonymous stories the author claims to have heard.
- fakesheriff 5y ago
  I have a theory that people who hate rms skew authoritarian and collectivist. I'm not sure why. I do know that authoritarian collectivist societies tend to organize themselves around cults of personality, and tend to have cultures where public figures are either heroes or villainous enemies. It's like they don't have a concept of "this person did important world changing work that should be celebrated, but also has a lot of problems and flaws".
- radmuzom 5y ago
  > no one will cover for him Look at https://stallmansupport.org/#intro https://stallmansupport.org/#intro There are many people covering for him, including a lot of prominent women.
  - radmuzom 5y ago
    Funny how stating "Washington D.C is the capital of USA" can also invite down-votes from some people.
seoaeu 5y ago
The proverbial straw was a blog post (which notably was not anonymous) that summarized decades of objectionable behavior, triggered by some messages RMS sent to a 6000 person workplace email list which downplayed rape allegations against a man accused of sexually assaulting an under-aged trafficked sex slave
- kragen 5y ago
  Rape allegations against a dead man, accused on the basis of no evidence, by people who didn't know the alleged victim --- who has, herself, made no such allegations against the dead man in question. Moreover they are allegations that the alleged perpetrator's wife has given evidence against. Those are precisely the kinds of rape allegations we should all be downplaying.
  - seoaeu 5y ago
    > accused on the basis of no evidence, by people who didn't know the alleged victim This simply isn't true. There was testimony by the victim. But regardless, Stallman didn't even dispute the allegations. He accepted the claims as true and expressed that he saw nothing morally wrong about them
    - kragen 5y ago
      Yes, there was testimony by the alleged victim: she said that she was ordered to seduce Minsky (the alleged perpetrator) by her pimp, not that she succeeded in doing so, and she never testified that she had any sexual contact with Minsky. Stallman did not claim that he saw nothing morally wrong about this situation (his public denunciations of the pimp have been vehement and extreme), but rather that, if she succeeded, Minsky wasn't the guilty party.
      - seoaeu 5y ago
        Yes, Stallman indicated that he thought raping an under-aged trafficked sex slave wasn't grounds to consider someone a guilty party. That doesn't strike you as the kind of thing that would be received poorly? These aren't the sort of crimes where most people consider "oops, I didn't realize" an acceptable defense

> also this is from 2016, which is why recent events were not even hinted at. Wasn't the cancel Stallman movement pretty much... an anonymous blog post and nothing else?

bitwize 5y ago

It was decades of stories and complaints from women about his bad behavior, as well as men who have worked closely with him and covered for him during that time. Now the bill has come due, and no one will cover for him because he hasn't learned. The best thing anyone can do for him is to let him face the consequences he brought upon himself.

908B64B197 5y ago
Other than this anonymous blog post https://selamjie.medium.com/remove-richard-stallman-fec6ec210794 https://selamjie.medium.com/remove-richard-stallman-fec6ec21... and some comments he made on a mailing list that were completely twisted, what exactly did he do wrong?
- geofft 5y ago
  Well, hold up, let's clarify what's meant by "do wrong." A lot of people deeply involved with the free software and open source movement(s), including people who worked at the FSF, had been unhappy with him as a leader for a long time. https://wingolog.org/archives/2019/10/08/thoughts-on-rms-and-gnu https://wingolog.org/archives/2019/10/08/thoughts-on-rms-and... (GNU project maintainer, summarizing - with links - views of other GNU maintainners) and http://ebb.org/bkuhn/blog/2019/10/15/fsf-rms.html http://ebb.org/bkuhn/blog/2019/10/15/fsf-rms.html (long-time FSF staff, Conservancy cofounder, and 2021 FSF awardee) are good places to start reading. Or see how FSF staff unionized (unusually for tech!) to protect themselves from him (https://twitter.com/paulnivin/status/1374532930400227328 https://twitter.com/paulnivin/status/1374532930400227328 , https://twitter.com/NovalisDMT/status/1172573166956437505 https://twitter.com/NovalisDMT/status/1172573166956437505). It's true that that blog post (which was not anonymous, there's a name on it???) is what catalyzed something to actually happen, and you can dispute whether the blog post by itself merited anything. And - largely because these were things that a small group of people were trying to handle internally (did you know that the FSF staff are unionized?) - there didn't seem to be much public discussion beyond that one blog post. The GNU maintainers' mailing list is private, the discussions between FSF board members are private, etc. So, it certainly looked to the casual observer like it was a single blog post. But that wasn't the reality.
  - redis_mlc 5y ago
    You know, I read the various anti-rms links 6 months ago and saw nothing convincing, and I still don't today. The wingo link is vague and mostly drivel: bkuhn's link has disingenuous statements. Why does an article primarily about rms have references to Epstein and MIT? How clumsy is that? I'd describe both links as nothing more than ad hominem character assassinations. I'd even go so far as to say they're written to inflate the status of the author (ie. "I know him, but I'm not like him."), not deal with an actual problems beyond "I don't like his style." Major contributors to our society deserve better than essentially publicly-hosted gossip.
- nomdep 5y ago
  Being an autistic man /s
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- fenomas 5y ago
  > this anonymous blog post https://selamjie.medium.com https://selamjie.medium.com The author's name is right there in the URL.
  - 908B64B197 5y ago
    But there's no first hand accounts of anything. It's all anonymous stories the author claims to have heard.
fakesheriff 5y ago
I have a theory that people who hate rms skew authoritarian and collectivist. I'm not sure why. I do know that authoritarian collectivist societies tend to organize themselves around cults of personality, and tend to have cultures where public figures are either heroes or villainous enemies. It's like they don't have a concept of "this person did important world changing work that should be celebrated, but also has a lot of problems and flaws".
radmuzom 5y ago
> no one will cover for him Look at https://stallmansupport.org/#intro https://stallmansupport.org/#intro There are many people covering for him, including a lot of prominent women.
- radmuzom 5y ago
  Funny how stating "Washington D.C is the capital of USA" can also invite down-votes from some people.

seoaeu 5y ago

The proverbial straw was a blog post (which notably was not anonymous) that summarized decades of objectionable behavior, triggered by some messages RMS sent to a 6000 person workplace email list which downplayed rape allegations against a man accused of sexually assaulting an under-aged trafficked sex slave

kragen 5y ago
Rape allegations against a dead man, accused on the basis of no evidence, by people who didn't know the alleged victim --- who has, herself, made no such allegations against the dead man in question. Moreover they are allegations that the alleged perpetrator's wife has given evidence against. Those are precisely the kinds of rape allegations we should all be downplaying.
- seoaeu 5y ago
  > accused on the basis of no evidence, by people who didn't know the alleged victim This simply isn't true. There was testimony by the victim. But regardless, Stallman didn't even dispute the allegations. He accepted the claims as true and expressed that he saw nothing morally wrong about them
  - kragen 5y ago
    Yes, there was testimony by the alleged victim: she said that she was ordered to seduce Minsky (the alleged perpetrator) by her pimp, not that she succeeded in doing so, and she never testified that she had any sexual contact with Minsky. Stallman did not claim that he saw nothing morally wrong about this situation (his public denunciations of the pimp have been vehement and extreme), but rather that, if she succeeded, Minsky wasn't the guilty party.
    - seoaeu 5y ago
      Yes, Stallman indicated that he thought raping an under-aged trafficked sex slave wasn't grounds to consider someone a guilty party. That doesn't strike you as the kind of thing that would be received poorly? These aren't the sort of crimes where most people consider "oops, I didn't realize" an acceptable defense