Linus is clearly not malevolent, not ill-intentioned, but he's closed-minded somewhat. He hasn't seen what the effect might be if he was a little more inhibited

Linus is clearly not malevolent, not ill-intentioned, but he's closed-minded somewhat. He hasn't seen what the effect might be if he was a little more inhibited about cursing people out. I think of this as the nice vs angry coach sorta thing. There are sports coaches who are nice people and ones who are assholes and both groups include legendary successful coaches. Clearly, this is not a make-or-break issue, but also it's clear that being an asshole doesn't help, even though assholes often claim it does. Like successful asshole coaches, Linus clearly wants the best for the community, he just has this asshole way of thinking about how to achieve it, and he's wrong enough that he's clearly out of balance. And if something could convince him to just temper things or apologize a little, it would be a helpful step. He still deserves honor and respect overall regardless, but it would be better if we didn't have to qualify that.