I share this frustration, unfortunately with many HN discussions as well.
When someone states a position that the majority finds repugnant, IMHO the most productive (long-term) approach is this:
Step 1. Identify where the minority and majority views diverge in terms of logical justification. With majority-repugnant views, this may require going back to very basic assumptions. E.g., rape is morally wrong, it's appropriate public policy to prevent moral wrongs, etc.
Step 2. Starting from there, try to understand why the views diverge, and debate which side (if either) has better justification.
I think this approach fails at least half the times I try it, though. A few guesses why:
- During Step 1, people jump to the assumption that I'm advocating the majority-repugnant position, rather than working within this two-step process. Once my character / motives are impugned, reasoned discussion seems to end.
- Many people are unable to engage in logical debate regarding ethics. And in frustration, or to subconsciously avoid having to accept that gaps exist in their ability to logically debate some topics, they are unwilling to engage in proper debate.
- Something in my mannerism is off-putting, or I'm in a forum where few people are willing to engage in a debate lasting more than several minutes :(
The point of this is that as people start to integrate political views into themselves (as opposed to just a view - something that's subject to change as the evidence does) it makes debate difficult. In many ways we're becoming more akin to religious nations. You're unlikely to find a nice healthy debate about the value, worth, and viability of Islam in most Islamic Nations. It is because such values have been integrated into the individuals themselves instead of being kept at arm's length.
And as a tangent one thing I would add is that it obviously was not always this way. During the Islamic Golden Age Islamic nations were world leaders in learning, education, and the collection of wisdom. We still retain fragments of this time in our language today. For instance Algebra, from the title of Ilm al-jabr wa'l-muḳābala by al-Khwarizmi around 800AD. During this time of growth and learning all things were open to question, including Islam itself. And then along came a lovely man by the name of Al-Ghazali [2].
In response to religious skepticism, which Al-Ghazali was unable to effectively combat on direct logical grounds, he chose to develop a new philosophy. And in his new philosophy he preempted skepticism by suggesting that there were no natural laws at all. When a leaf catches fire it is not because it was exposed to a fire or because it reached a certain level of heat but because, and only because, God willed it happen at that exact moment. And so the study of 'natural laws' is nonsensical, as detailed in his work 'The Incoherence of the Philosophers.'
And that idea, enabling one to revoke all logic and criticism and simply adopt the dogma without question or concern, was met with resounding praise and endorsement. That was 900 years ago, but this ideology remains a key component of Islam to this day. At the same time this was happening a lust for learning was just starting to take off in Europe... Kind of interesting to imagine that we could be on another precipice of change when 200 years from now e.g. China has become the world leader in education and people ponder the decline of the anglosphere.
Or this could be little more than the regular waxing and waning of insanity that in 20 years, perhaps sooner, will feel as distant as parachute pants.
[1] - https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2016/11/17/is...
He's clearly a freethinker, and we have all gotten a lot of advantages from his courage doing his thing and making his vision for FOSS a reality.
Now he's said his thoughts on this too... it's legitimate for him to do so and "problematic" everyone is in a huge panic to punish him in case the mob should get set on them.
He was a terrible human being, and surely not very aware of how to treat other humans. He had no place in a research institution, or getting paid to pretend to be relevant on free software.
Good riddance, whatever reason we can find in his statements (yeah sure, I was 18 when my wife was 17, it wasn't rape, surely... but is that really the point people were making about his nice friend of Epstein ?).
People aren't for free speech, at all and anywhere: they are for people having the same opinion as them or follow an official line. He didn't do either, now he pays. For a genius like him, it should have been easy to understand you have to adapt if you want to lead, or you shut up if you see you can't lead.
Firing someone is not taking their life from them.
Also, firing someone is taking their livelihood from them. rms might be more comfortable than the average worker, but part of the reason there are special rules around work is in society today people need to work to survive. rms might be wealthy and have a cushion, I have no idea and so this might not apply to him. On the other hand however, free software has been his life's work, and he is being forced out of the organizations he started in order to further that cause. He probably will be hampered from ever contributing to free software moving forward. It might not be on the level of a walmart worker living paycheck to paycheck (which sure is a larger problem) but it is a wrong, at some level, to him if he is not offered a better deal or a chance to change.
https://geekfeminism.wikia.org/wiki/Richard_Stallman
You may not like the source, but they link to actual examples.
It's the leader's responsibility to create an environment that others feel safe joining.
He did a shit job at that.
I'm in a group he had been fine towards, but I've never found him someone I'd like to follow.
His bad behavior is not new, it's been going on for a very long time, why does he need more time to change? His statement on why he left makes it pretty clear he feels like he didn't say anything problematic.
In America at least, we have an entire social safety net intended to avoid that scenario. Doesn't always work as intended, but there are too many counter examples to that simple description to accepted it at face value.
What people often do need work for is self-actualization, money for non-essentials, or to feel like they're making meaningful contributions to society. I don't see anything about RMS stepping down from the FSF that precludes him from submitting patches to whatever open source project he would like, or precludes him from publishing his own thoughts and research on his own website.
He’s had decades to listen to people telling him that his behaviour was unacceptable. The fact that he hasn’t changed at all is on him.
I mean, you know he´s going to be monothematic about his beliefs, but I heard nothing besides that.
This just isn't true. Sure I want every one to respect my opinion but I don't want them to be a slave to it. I mean think about it if every one thought the same life would be boring as fuck.
No we don't. Your vague unspecified second-hand stories aren't any kind of evidence or argument. Come with specifics or this is just slander.
Whether or not specifics are provided is irrelevant as to whether or not it's slander.
Specifics may be relevant to whether you personally believe it, but that's also not relevant to whether it is factually slander.
> a claim or assertion that someone has done something illegal or wrong, typically one made without proof.
I'm not defending what he said but this is a really backwards way to look at things. There are plenty of manipulative CEOs and public figures who are very careful with their speech while doing harm in their actions. Stallman turned down money for decades to do something good for the sake of public interest. There really aren't many people like that, in this industry or even on this site. It sucks he conflated his movement like this, but jumping to that conclusion based on something so shallow seems just as stupid.
In order to ward off his advances, women faculty at MIT have taken to taking advantage of his phobia of plants. They decorate their offices with as many plants as they can and have even taken to wearing plants just to keep him from hitting on them.
This is not and should never be acceptable behavior.
Taking in mind that there are dozens, maybe thousands of photos of him on internet smiling near flowers, pots, pots over tables, cut flowers, taking photos of wild flowers, or posing relaxed on several jungles and forests, my congratulations to Mr Stallman for having overcomed his botagnuphobia so well.
This is not what you would expect from a real phobic person IMHO, so I wouldn't discard still that is just another stupid rumour (or perhaps some female students are overreacting badly to a rumour?).
Did anyone ever report this behavior to law enforcement? Did anyone try to obtain a restraining order against him?
It is not illegal to invite (adult) people to have sex with you, orally or in writing, so there is nothing for law enforcement to do.
> Did anyone try to obtain a restraining order against him?
Offering sex to other adults isn't illegal, so there would be no basis for a restraining order.
A while back some friends and I came up with his super-villain name. Batman had The Riddler, but Epstein would be... drum roll... The Diddler! Now roll that into one of those old campy Batman episodes from the 60s and you'd have a hell of a skit.
All I can do is laugh at this stuff sometimes. The alternative is to get depressed about the lack of judgement that seems to be routinely shown by otherwise very bright people who should know better. People seem to be such suckers for these charismatic psychopath types and their "energy."
I hope he never has the occurence to disguise as Poison Lenny in the next halloween, My poor heart couldn't afford more jump-scares.
> They decorate their offices with as many plants as they can and have even taken to wearing plants just to keep him from hitting on them.
I used to live and work around MIT and I'm trying to decide if this equals or exceeds the ludicrous batshit insane ass clowning that I witnessed. I'm not sure.
My stories don't involve Stallman, but... well... I'll just say "tech weenie weenie" and anyone around MIT who knows will know.
Mahketing mahketing! (maniacal clap)
In any case I'm not at all surprised that someone like Epstein would be sleazing around MIT.
I need to shut up now.
- First they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out— Because I was not a socialist.
- Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out— Because I was not a trade unionist.
- Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out— Because I was not a Jew.
- Then they came for me— and there was no one left to speak for me.
That holds very true to this day in America. I really vehemently disagree with Stallman's views in many ways. So it's easy to not say anything, yet I do believe he has a right to say the things he does without getting depersoned. In any case I'd much rather the people that do abide his views do so publicly rather than in secret.
But beyond this, I think he chose a reasonable hill to die on. He undoubtedly knew his comments would spark a mob in the zeitgeist of today, but they really are about as tepid as you could get. He was saying it was a bad idea for terms, even if legally accurate, to be used in general speech when they mislead people as to the nature of a situation. If that's the new standard for moving from words to 'let's get rid of this guy', we may not even have a standard. And I think that's a point that will resonate for more and more people. Even if these people might be afraid to speak out for fear of becoming the mobs' next target, it helps bring about a positive change in society.
An analogy I love to consider is Lincoln. Did Lincoln end slavery and direct society accordingly or did society reach a point such that the creation of a Lincoln was, sooner or later, inevitable - even if by another name? And I think things like this bring us ever closer to creating our Lincoln because solving the problems of social media is not something that's going to be done in a clean fashion.
According to the Register, this is the position of both the SFC and GNOME
> On Monday, the Software Freedom Conservancy called for his resignation. "When considered with other reprehensible comments he has published over the years, these incidents form a pattern of behavior that is incompatible with the goals of the free software movement," the group said in a blog post. "We call for Stallman to step down from positions of leadership in our movement."
> So did the GNOME Foundation's executive director Neil McGovern, who said Stallman's Minksy defense email was "the straw that broke the camel’s back."
https://www.theregister.co.uk/2019/09/17/richard_stallman_in...
You're right that this isn't new, but at some point the camel's back breaks and the idea that it's so implausible that what he said happened to, y'know, really upset people when they read it and that they'd had enough--well, it's a pretty cheap charge on your part.
I didn't know that GNOME has had issues with Stallman before, though I do believe it now and can certainly imagine it; I learned a few new, bad things about his behavior that I didn't know prior to today. Still, my point is - if they wanted to get rid of him for a list of valid reasons, they could've done it earlier, or they could've waited for the current storm to blow over and do it then. They picked this moment, and unless I'm grossly misunderstanding the timeline, they must've known it'll get carried by the media. So for better or worse, out of all possible opportunities, they picked the one where RMS is a subject of borderline-libelous and utterly nonsense shitstorm. Sure, people got upset when the news broke, but that's the thing with Internet witch hunts - people get upset over lies, and react without thinking, further fueling the avalanche.
While it was known to not be isolated beforehand, it's pretty clear to me that a number of people have felt safe to tell their own stories in the couple days since this broke. I live near MIT but did not attend, and so I am not in any particularly privileged circles; despite that, this incident prompted a lot of people to speak up about RMS's consistent bad personal behavior as well as his bad public behavior. These sorts of things have a way of providing courage to people who have felt suppressed--someone is brave enough to kick one rock and dozens more come with. I would submit that if a nobody like me is hearing that stuff it is a near-certainty that people with hire-and-fire authority at MIT, and in decision-making roles at the FSF and GNOME, are hearing it and likely more.
This is what makes most of the protestations in this thread (not, I stress, the ones that you're laying out) so disheartening. On one hand you've got people adjusting their pince-nez and going "well, really, don't we need to have a conversation about statutory rape?" (we don't), while you've got another contingent who are all about clapping for pedophiles to "own the libs". It's just...really gross, and it's not about "free thinking" or "free speech" at all. (And it never really is.)
I might be biased otherwise (RMS lost a lot in my eyes due to new information I learned in this thread), and my initial introduction was the Medium post that started the media storm, but reading RMS's writing, I saw him explicitly not absolving Minsky from wrongdoing, but getting pedantic about the language, in an attempt to ensure the accusations being flung around are as close to what (he believed) could be made with available information. I immediately thought, "man, this is about the worst time to be pedantic, people will eat you for this alive", but honestly, trying to make the accusations wielded against a deceased friend accurate is laudable.
Much like I'm disgusted by some of the things I've learned today, I still feel that the original Medium post and the latter media reporting based on it are essentially character assassination performed to push a cause and (in the case of the media reporting) push ads. That's why I called it utterly nonsense.
I agree that things come in waves once you open the floodgates; RMS being criticized for one instance of bad behavior gives a reason to air other (perhaps less known) stories from the past. From my point of view, given that I consider this particular outrage over this particular misbehavior grossly overblown and based on mischaracterization, I'm just disappointed the camel broke its back immediately, legitimizing the current outrage. Even if getting rid of him for all the past transgressions, I would feel much better if they waited a few days.
TBH I wouldn't expect that if they did for it to be public knowledge. In fact I'd assume that has happened.
1. RMS wasn't just some random guy in the foundation, he was supposed to be a leader which means he should be held to a higher standard. Firing someone who doesn't meet that standard means your organisation has integrity which is important and should be applauded.
2. The downsides for keeping him around, especially since RMS didn't seem to be all that apologetic, are also important. The goals of the FSF are not advanced by being pushed into this media storm.
If FSF didn't do something, they would have been forced to answer alot of questions in the media about how they actually feel about age of consent laws, whether they took any money from Epstein and/or Minsky, how they felt about Epstein and/or Minsky, etc., and would then have had to give a number of awkward statements about this mess. Then they would have also had to answer many of those same questions from their donors. And likely if the controversy gained traction, their largest donors may have then been forced to answer their own set of awkward questions from the media about this whole mess. Especially if those donors also had ties to MIT. At some point, many of them would have also reconsidered whether they wanted to donate money to FSF, which would also be bad for the organisation.
All of which is to say that it's not about free speech, it's about protecting the organisation.
I agree with this statement.
Stallman has been a problematic person for a long time. I'm no fan of his. If after a while the university had said, "Enough is enough, Richard, you need to shape up or get out." I would have understood that.
However, that's not what I think happened. What happened was he shared an opinion on a hot-button issue, pedantic and maybe gross, and unfortunately had that go viral and was so hounded out of his position.
If Stallman's position is wrong, we should be able to rationally come to that conclusion as a society. He should be allowed to be wrong. If his opinion is so problematic that it makes him a real liability for the university, his removal should come after a period of deliberation, not after a flash of public outrage.
I can understand arguments that Stallman's position is a questionable hill to die on regarding the Epstein revelations, that even choosing to weigh in on this makes it seem like his priorities are out of order. I can also understand the argument that the email list he was arguing on was the wrong location to voice his opinions and he was making students uncomfortable. I also understand the idea that he should have been corrected by the university, either for this event or for his past behavior.
But what I don't understand, is this idea that firing people in response to media shit-storms is somehow something to be applauded.