Not freely sharing the fruits of one's labors is hardly "parasitic". Rather, it would be more accurate to call it "not sharing", which is a very very different

Not freely sharing the fruits of one's labors is hardly "parasitic". Rather, it would be more accurate to call it "not sharing", which is a very very different thing. This whole style of argumentation is a hallmark of RMS' rhetorical style, and is something that turns off a lot of people to his message, even those who might otherwise agree with many of his principles. If you have to use hyperbolic language to demonize those you disagree with (equating programmers of proprietary software as parasites), and putting those you agree with on a pedestal (equating programming of free software as the only way to create value), then people who are not already in the choir you're preaching to (which is what you're doing) will conclude that your beliefs are basically just you romanticizing the whole situation rather than something you came to through any sort of real intellectual process that holds any weight. You could be 100% correct and no one would ever know it, because it's being expressed as a lot of kneejerk emotional reactions to a lot of things. RMS has always done the same thing, using his fundamental choice of words to smear and denigrate those he disagreed with by turning them all into strawmen, and elevating his own philosophy beyond simply espousing a particular virtue to presenting it as a stark moral choice to which any variation or disagreement is immoral. This automatically puts him into the category of people who are either wrong, or who have come to a correct conclusion through completely invalid means (pretty unlikely, but not impossible- broken clocks are right twice a day, etc.). I guess it's more exciting to think about these issues as being a bunch of stark, binary moral choices with no gray areas, and sorting everyone into those who are 100% on board with your cause one one side, and a bunch of sinners or heretics or whatever on the other side, but the historical track record for those sorts of philosophers and philosophies is not stellar, to say the least.