I think "open source is political" uses the word 'political' in a significantly different way than stuff like "I'd hate to see more politics in software discuss

I think "open source is political" uses the word 'political' in a significantly different way than stuff like "I'd hate to see more politics in software discussions". Consider: "Open source is political": the power 'open source' relates to is the power of the licensed software's users to read the program's source code, and to redistribute/modify the program. Insofar as there's a moral vision to it, the idea of a world where users are unable to distribute/modify/etc. their software is worse than a world with open source software. Whereas, the meta-statement "don't bring politics into discussions" is more like rules-of-engagement for discussion involving a diverse group of people. The 'political' in the statement refers to e.g. moral or ideological points of view. -- "asl2.0, but you have to agree abortion is murder" is 'political' in a different way than "asl2.0, you can't use this software if your name is Jared", because the restrictions itself is about a moral disagreement.