News for hackers. Stuff that matters.
Re:Richard M. Stallman resigns by simag on Tuesday September 17, 2019 @05:29AM (#20993226)
I disagree with Stallman's skepticism (I do think it harms children and I don't think children can make that choice). But that one liner does not make him a pedophilia advocate. That makes him someone who is wrong on that topic.
Re:Richard M. Stallman resigns by DanBC on Tuesday September 17, 2019 @07:12AM (#20993667)
He didn't know what he was talking about, but felt it was okay to use his public platform to say it anyway. That's not scepticism. It's laziness. We have reams of evidence to show that paedophilia is harmful to children, and a 5 minute web search would have returned some of it.
Re:Richard M. Stallman resigns by AnIdiotOnTheNet on Tuesday September 17, 2019 @09:54AM (#20995074)
> He didn't know what he was talking about, but felt it was okay to use his public platform to say it anyway.

You've described basically every single human being in tech I've ever met, they just don't have as big a platform. See: Musk's twitter feed, for instance.

Re:Richard M. Stallman resigns by AstralStorm on Wednesday September 18, 2019 @04:49AM (#21003429)
If this is so easy, please provide links to research, preferably not done by a clearly biased organization. (E.g. not IICSA) Books are acceptable too, as long as they're research.

There are only a handful of case studies of really bad cases I'm aware of. And they're not that exacting in follow-up.

Note research, not opinion pieces.

Good quality papers. I found just a handful. I'm having trouble fishing then out from the thousands of opinion pieces.

Edit: I found one credible meta-analysis so far, and the results are not good. Most of abuse is not reported. Impact is not known, how handling of it is done is unknown to affect severity.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3720272/

Re:Richard M. Stallman resigns by Avamander on Tuesday September 17, 2019 @08:16AM (#20994035)
And he did retract that more than a decade old statement.
Re:Richard M. Stallman resigns by greedo on Tuesday September 17, 2019 @09:24AM (#20994743)
It took him a decade to retract that statement, said retraction conveniently occurring when this shitstorm about Epstein is reaching a crescendo. Retractions and apologies with such timing appear awfully convenient and insincere.
Re:Richard M. Stallman resigns by Avamander on Tuesday September 17, 2019 @10:27AM (#20995501)
Who remembers everything they've said more than a decade ago? He was reminded now that he had said that and has changed his views on it.
Re:Richard M. Stallman resigns by greedo on Tuesday September 17, 2019 @07:10PM (#21001000)
This isn't a verbal conversation, this is something he wrote on his own blog, no?
Re:Richard M. Stallman resigns by Avamander on Wednesday September 18, 2019 @06:31AM (#21003863)
Yes, but one doesn't have neither written or regular speech memorized so it doesn't matter which it was.
Re:Richard M. Stallman resigns by seax on Tuesday September 17, 2019 @09:10AM (#20994562)
Why did it take him takes to come the the conclusion that sexually abusing children is wrong? And why are you defending that?
Re:Richard M. Stallman resigns by Avamander on Tuesday September 17, 2019 @10:24AM (#20995451)
Because who remembers everything they've said? I do what?
Re:Richard M. Stallman resigns by boring_twenties on Wednesday September 18, 2019 @12:25AM (#21002376)
Yeah but is there a web search engine that respects your freedom?
Re:Richard M. Stallman resigns by oblio on Tuesday September 17, 2019 @07:09AM (#20993647)
If you're wrong about something, are famous and put that wrong thing on your site, you are advocating for that wrong thing.

Because people believing in that wrong thing will point to you as a figure of authority.

Not fair, but life's not fair.