The fact is, the reporting around the event that actually did get him fired was beyond awful and disingenuous. By throwing up your hands and saying "yeah maybe those articles were a crock of lies, but that's fine because he actually did do some shitty stuff before too" you're contributing to an environment in which it's that much harder to distinguish honest reporting from fabricated character assassination.
I think this [0] comment from Reddit does a good job refuting the "straw that broke the camel's back" argument:
"""
Amazing how much damage dishonest media coverage can do, even though it's both trivial to prove their misquotes false and we now have an witness further supporting Stallman's original argument. Summary of events:
In a recently unsealed deposition a woman testified that, at the age of 17, Epstein told her to have sex with Marvin Minsky. Minsky was a co-founder of the MIT Media Lab and pioneer in A.I. who died in 2016. Stallman argued on a mailing list (in response to a statement from a protest organizer accusing Minsky of sexual assault) that, while he condemned Epstein, Minsky likely did not know she was being coerced:
> We can imagine many scenarios, but the most plausible scenario is that she presented herself to him as entirely willing. Assuming she was being coerced by Epstein, he would have had every reason to tell her to conceal that from most of his associates.
Someone wrote a Medium blogpost called "Remove Richard Stallman" quoting the argument. Media outlets like Vice and The Daily Beast then lied and misquoted Stallman as saying that the woman was "entirely willing" (rather than pretending to be) and as "defending Epstein". Note the deposition doesn't say she had sex with Minsky, only that Epstein told her to do so. Since then physicist Greg Benford, who was present at the time, has stated that she propositioned Minsky and he turned her down:
> I know; I was there. Minsky turned her down. Told me about it. She saw us talking and didn’t approach me.
This seems like a complete validation of the distinction Stallman was making. If what Minsky knew doesn't matter, if there's no difference between "Minsky sexually assaulted a woman" and "Epstein told a 17-year-old to have sex with Minsky without his knowledge or consent", then why did he turn her down? We're supposed to consider a dead man a rapist for sex he didn't have because of something Epstein did without his knowledge, possibly even in a failed attempt to create blackmail material against him?
Despite this, Stallman has now been pressured to resign not just from MIT but from the Free Software Foundation that he founded. Despite (and sometimes because of) his eccentricities, I think Stallman was a very valuable voice in free-software, particularly as someone whose dedication to it as an ideal helped counterbalance corporate influence and the like. But if some journalists decide he should be out and are willing to tell lies about it, then apparently that's enough for him to be pushed out.
"""
https://www.reddit.com/r/technology/comments/d59efr/computer...
For fucks sake, this is not even an accusation to Minsky.
Take a minute to appreciate the fact that Minsky is being called a Rapist because somebody said that some person told another person to have sex with him. And he turned her down.
Instead, he said Minsky "probably" slept with the woman and then argued that this should not be considered sexual assault, even though at the very least it would have been statutory rape.
It's a bad look no matter how you spin it, and seems to indicate a kind of misogyny and treatment of women as sex objects. It seems to place him firmly in the toxic patriarchy which is no longer considered acceptable.
I saw a comment along the lines that Stallman is still living in the 1970s in that respect. That's a problem for a public figurehead today, unless of course they're a right-wing conservative.
So I believe the problem comes down to these two very different situations sharing the same name. Maybe they don't carry the same punishment, I'm not sure, but I definitely don't agree with calling both of these situations the same name, especially when that name includes the word rape. There's a gravity there that I believe the situation with the 20 and 17 year old doesn't carry, but the situation with the 20 and 13 year old does.
Or, there is this quote:
“All I know she said about Minsky is that Epstein directed her to have sex with Minsky. That does not say whether Minsky knew that she was being coerced. it does not report what each said and did during their sexual encounter. We can imagine various scenarios.”
Or this one:
“it is morally absurd to define ‘rape’ in a way that depends on minor details such as which country it was in or whether the victim was 18 years old or 17”
With all due respect to your argument, this is not a case of a 20 year old and a 17 year old. This is a case of a 73 year old esteemed researcher at an institution with undergraduate students having sex with a 17 year old in a country that defines such an age difference as statutory rape.
Stallman’s idea about how it’s absurd to define rape according to age or country is offensive in every way imaginable. Sovereign nations are allowed to set and enforce their own laws. Other sovereign nations are allowed to choose whether to extradite their citizens back to those nations to face their justice system. But the act of entering a country is an agreement that you will respect its sovereignty and its laws. If you argue against that, you’re effectively arguing against the entire basis of international law and international relations. That would be an interesting argument, but let’s talk about mineral rights instead of child sexual abuse.
As for age, countries around the world recognize that children cannot be expected to provide informed consent to engage in sexual activity. They argue that by statute, some children are not capable of consenting to sexual activity. These countries have tried to come up with policy to deal with how absolute differences in age don’t necessarily account for differences in maturity. Some countries will not enforce statutory rape laws if the age difference is slight. Other countries enforce their own laws differently to account for different situations. This is a case of a 56 year age difference involving a pedophile, an eminent researcher and a victim of child trafficking.
All of that aside, the fact is that a victim chose to come forward and make herself available to be deposed. During this deposition, the victim said that she was coerced into having sex with Minsky.
Minsky is dead. Why not believe the victim? What do we gain from pedantic arguments about the nature of international law and sexual abuse?
* Edited because my first version was poorly written and almost incomprehensible.
Here's a list of the age of consent by nation worldwide: http://worldpopulationreview.com/countries/age-of-consent-by...
So tell us, which value is the "real" age of consent and what the moral reasoning is that makes it and no other value the correct one?
Or here is another one. A 73 year old had sex with someone 56 years younger than him. This 73 year old is an educator at one of the top Universities in the world yet he still chose to engage without absolutely ensuring that she consented. The moral path is to look around, realize there is something seriously wrong with Epstein and his harem (Stallman’s word) and stay the hell away.
> The reference reports the claim that Minsky had sex with one of Epstein’s harem. ... Let’s presume that was true (I see no reason to disbelieve it).
never, in the hundreds of pages of depositions.
Instead of talking about MIT that took money from Epstein, we're talking about Stallman that never did.
The motte is relatively easy to defend... Richard isn't the most charming guy and comes off as a creep, so he shouldn't be a leader. But it's not the most persuasive argument.
The bailey is hard to defend... the various misinterpretations of Richard's email. Despite these interpretations being wrong, they're emotionally persuasive. If someone uses logic against them, the antagonist can always retreat to the motte.
Is it fair? (And consider that I'm looking solely at the motte part; disregarding entirely this most recent event): Well, for most definitions of fair, it is not. Nevertheless, I don't think MIT, GNU, FSF, or any other entity should suffer significant damage just to chase the ideal of someone with RMS's peculiar ways gets to do the job of being an advocate of their organization.
It boils down to this: Is it acceptable to fire someone from a job based on something they are not really responsible for?
I think if the job description itself, prior to you taking it, makes clear that: Yes, you will be fired then – that it is fine.
The vast majority of clearly public facing jobs work like this. If you're the CEO and you do something rather upsetting, but not illegal, in a private setting that leaks out and which has absolutely no bearing whatsoever on the company or on your ability to perform your job there... you still get fired: The board weighs the value of your presence in your C-level role vs. the next best candidate vs. the damage done to 'the brand' by leaving you there, and a swift decision is made.
It's hard to draw lines in the sand on this. Both the public-ness of your role as well as the severity of how upset the public is about the unrelated thing need to be taken into account.
Imagine some sales rep at a company has a sextape leaked from years ago. Is it fair to fire them? Probably not.
Imagine that same sales rep has a penis tattoo'd on their forehead. Is it fair to fire them? Probably yeah, and the reason is not really: "They will do a bad job at sales itself". The reason is: "Most of your job is selling the product, put a small part of it is simply reflecting on the company. And with that tattoo you're doing such an incredibly bad job at that last part, we dont even want to know how well you will be doing at the first: You're out".
My point is, for RMS? I estimate that he is on the 'his firing his justified' side of the line for virtually anybody's sense of fairness.
The job the description would pertain to didn't exist before he created it by filling it.
I don't think any of the more palatable audience-friendly "FOSS" luminaries are going to decline being flown business-class, and then ask for the price difference to be donated.
Open source opinion maker is a solid career path now, and will attract the sort of people interested in making careers.
rms has shown through example to be incorruptable. That's the only requirement, but it's hard to find. All the rest is nice-to-have.
You can see it if you assume that some (even most) of the people judging weren't part of the community at the time and might just have learned of it.
Yes, it doesn't make a lot of sense that his previous unacceptable behavior has been tolerated. Pressure on him, should have been so much earlier.
You don't have to trust the media. RMS himself confirms that he was wrong in the past, at least regarding child abuse.
"I hosted rms many years ago in the 90’s, what was supposed to be hosting your hero for a ~3 day thing became a ~2 month nightmare."
Did Miguel ask him to leave? Or did he just sit around passive-aggressively for 3 whole months? Also, rms called Miguel "a traitor to the Free Software community" at some point, and now with the whole MIT business, he gets in with the twitter defamation league spouting off his grievances. That's pretty much beyond cowardly and into despicable territory.
Jillian's story is pretty much the entire problem in a nutshell:
"an older female colleague recommended at a whisper that I lock myself in my office."
"She later told me it was because he gets touchy"
"Over the years, I heard all sorts of things of this nature, and warned women who might not be in the know"
Maybe this older female colleague was told the same things at some point? Why is every single allegation hearsay from twitter?
"instructing them on how to properly make tea"
Yes, rms can be very particular about minor things. If you did not know even this, why are you writing about "things about rms others should know"?
Also, again EFF connections. Do they even want to pretend to be useful anymore, outside of cluelessly abusing people on twitter for kicks?
People are literally celebrating a "long overdue" injustice because they don't like the man, so "he had it coming". I don't know how can anyone not find this unsetting.
I never said otherwise. If you look at my comment history you will see that I am against the injustice against RMS.
I certainly agree with you.
This type of rumor mongering is hurtful and should be opposed.
Exactly, he's innocent until proven guilty, like everybody else.
You're implying that "I heard from someone that heard it from someone else, that heard it from their dad, that read it on a mailing list, 20 years ago, that he did, therefore ho did"
seems does not qualify as evidence
> circles that interacted with RMS
Like Thomas Lord?
I think there is only mud, not based on any real issue with what Stallman said or did.
> does not automatically follow that it was the wrong thing to do.
It does.
FSF main goal was freedom and protecting fundamental liberties of each individual
Stallman main contribution to FSF was the GPL, a legal framework, FSF main contribution was pro bono legal support defending free software in court.
So, yeah, if FSF cannot defend its founder, most popular and most honorable member, it becomes basically useless, it follows it was the wrong thing to do.
Their reputation was based on trust, trust has been broken.
Two, https://medium.com/@thomas.bushnell/a-reflection-on-the-depa...
> Minsky is also dead, and there’s plenty of time to discuss at leisure whatever questions there may be about his culpability.
"Bushnell [..] is employed by Google LLC. He is a member of Saint Mark's Episcopal Church."
With all due respect to his employment and religious beliefs, that is not the sort of person to provide a better understanding of Stallman, in general or psychologically.
No? FTA:
> But I’ll give you a personal take. By my reckoning, I worked for RMS longer than any other programmer.
The straw that broke the camel's back could be the wrong metaphor. Maybe it's more like the dam burst.
[1] https://stallman.org/archives/2012-nov-feb.html#04_January_2...
Also note that it is a difference between an empirical claim and a moral claim. While empirical claim that some action almost always leads to negative outcome to others could be used as an argument for that action being immoral, it is still perfectly valid to attack the supporting empirical claim, while not attacking the moral claim.
There are Stallman's statements defending non-coercive sex with children, but they are older:
https://stallman.org/archives/2003-may-aug.html#28%20June%20...
At least there is this one from 14th September, also on his site:
https://stallman.org/archives/2019-jul-oct.html#14_September...
" Many years ago I posted that I could not see anything wrong about sex between an adult and a child, if the child accepted it.
Through personal conversations in recent years, I've learned to understand how sex with a child can harm per psychologically. This changed my mind about the matter: I think adults should not do that. I am grateful for the conversations that enabled me to understand why."
Citation needed. He expressed the same opinion in 2013 that he did in 2006 and 2003:
https://stallman.org/archives/2012-nov-feb.html#04_January_2...
https://stallman.org/archives/2006-may-aug.html#05%20June%20...
https://stallman.org/archives/2003-may-aug.html#28%20June%20...
But even if he hadn't changed his opinion there would be nothing wrong with that imo.
The stuff I did find was only tangentially related and not indicative of any changes in position, eg
https://stallman.org/archives/2016-jul-oct.html#16_September...
https://stallman.org/archives/2016-jul-oct.html#12_September...
https://stallman.org/archives/2016-jul-oct.html#15_July_2016...
> It is more important that innocence be protected than it is that guilt be punished, for guilt and crimes are so frequent in this world that they cannot all be punished. But if innocence itself is brought to the bar and condemned, perhaps to die, then the citizen will say, 'whether I do good or whether I do evil is immaterial, for innocence itself is no protection,' and if such an idea as that were to take hold in the mind of the citizen that would be the end of security whatsoever.
(1) Which is yet to be proven, btw. We shouldn't take destroying a man's reputation so lightly. But well, what do I know. The mob must enjoy its victories, even when they're really defeats.
In human nature it's extremely common to tolerate things too long and then bail out when something minuscule happens later.
Not ideal but easy to understand.
I don't see "human nature" as an acceptable excuse for anything at all.
It may be a straw, but it's a very heavy straw, placed at just the right location
> If Stallman's past behavior was unacceptable, then he should have been fired for that.
Indeed!
The fact that he wasn't fired for his past behaviour doesn't necessarily mean that his past behaviour was acceptable.
Not firing him for his past behaviour may just have been an error of judgement.
If I get away with (say) stealing once, that shouldn't mean I now have carte blanche to steal anything without consequence.
He was! He was fired for all that, and for this most recent incident as well. He wasn't fired for a single incident alone, but for a series of incidents, of which this was the most recent.
I also saw those accusations, but I didn't see any proof of the harassment except one girl that said Stallman asked her on a date. And bothering? you really think you can go for 60 years on this earth without bothering any person?
For me, the implication of a mattress in his office are that he might sleep there. Any other implications are in the dirty mind of the accusers.
I've also done this, please don't get me fired. Well, I was 15 at the time, but perhaps still better socially adjusted than Stallman at 60.
If true, that is deeply disturbing behavior.
Not even RMS.
It seems more likely to me he made the threat legitimately, but chose not to follow through.
Do you have evidence for your assertion that it was a joke?
The woman who experienced it certainly didn't perceive it as one.
If you genuinely think RMS was considering suicide over a date refusal, your likelyhood calibrations way off. He's weird, but he's not raving maniac. It is ok to exaggerate a little sometimes for the sake of argument, maybe, but really, there's bound of how far the credulity can be stretched.
> Do you have evidence for your assertion that it was a joke?
I just said it in my previous comment. Also, I've seen people. Virtually nobody, excepting gravely mentally ill people that are most likely already on heavy meds and being treated by psychiatrists, commits suicide over a date refusal from a random female.
> The woman who experienced it certainly didn't perceive it as one.
Not getting the joke is a common occurrence. I sometimes not get the jokes, even by professional comedians. And RMS never been a professional in this, so some rate of failure is expected. Making a huge deal out of it almost 40 years after it happened (to zero harm for anyone involved) is the insane part here. Especially as this seems to be the only documented episode of supposed myriads of harassment incidents RMS is supposedly famous for.
My perspective is that he made the threat in bad faith - trying to coerce the girl into going out with him, but without a truly deep depression and intention to kill himself. I expect there was and is at least some depression there - perhaps he really did consider killing himself but decided not to.
I am unfortunately very used to seeing people try to hide obnoxious behavior behind "it was just a joke, calm down," when people take offense instead of giving them what they want, so I very rarely find that explanation satisfactory.
There are other things feeding into my assessment that I haven't gone into - a story of him picking out one of the few women in a lecture hall as an "Emacs Virgin" and saying that in the Church of Emacs it is blessed to lose your virginity. Yeah, that clearly was a joke, but it was a tasteless one that gives a little too much insight into his perspective.
There's also the photo of his MIT office nameplate that said something like "Knight For Justice (also: hot ladies)" which, yes, is probably a joke, but reads like one of those "ha ha, only serious" jokes oldschool hackers are rather known for, and is once again a joke he absolutely shouldn't have been making (especially not from a position of power).
There are also the various hints on his website over the years that he was (and perhaps still is) single and frustrated by that. An anecdote about his official non-girlfriend stands out in my memory, as I recall.
It's not a "threat", since no reasonable people would take it seriously (just as no reasonable female would sue a suitor when he says "I am willing to give the whole world to you" but then refuses to give her mere $10000). If you ever been in a romantic relationship, you may know that courtship language involves some amount of flourish and exaggeration. Including worlds like "I can't live without you" and "you are the only thing my heart beats for" and so on. I could bring you a dozen examples from poetry, songs, etc. but I think you get my drift anyway.
Now, could the student in question genuinely misunderstand him and decide maybe he's genuinely suicidal? Maybe yes. People are weird. Maybe no, and she's misremembering or outright lying. Maybe the author of the article misunderstood or misquoted her (she's certainly motivated to do so as it's her only example of Stallman-female interaction over 30 year span which has anything objectionable at all, without it she's left with zero). There could be many options here. One option that is one of the least likely is that he genuinely "threatened" her - and it is obvious she didn't consider the threat seriously (otherwise she'd probably agree to a date and then call mental health services to report a suicidal person who's about to hurt himself). If somebody asked me to do something and I genuinely believed he'd kill himself if I didn't, I'd certainly not just say "no" and nonchalantly walk away.
> I am unfortunately very used to seeing people try to hide obnoxious behavior behind "it was just a joke, calm down,"
That happens. Many bad things happen. However, this has nothing to do with present case - Stallman is not Jesus sent to us to answer for the sins of the world. The only sins he has to answer for are his own, and so far the list is pretty thin.
> a story of him picking out one of the few women in a lecture hall as an "Emacs Virgin"
And? It may be not very tactful to single out a person (I am an introvert and can sympathize with hating being singled out) as a prop, but there's nothing sinister in it. Some social interactions aren't to everybody's liking, that happens. And the pearl-clutching over the word "virgin" is better left to a victorian era where the feet of the furniture were covered lest they suggest any dirty thoughts to anybody.
> is probably a joke
Probably? Seriously? Probably?
> a joke he absolutely shouldn't have been making (especially not from a position of power).
Why not? So, he declared himself a knight (people known - though often wrongly - for their chivalrous and courteous behavior towards females) for "hot ladies". And? What harm exactly did that do (and btw what terrible Power did Stallman have in MIT, except having his own office?)
> There are also the various hints on his website over the years that he was (and perhaps still is) single and frustrated by that
Oh horror. Now you really shocked me. He is single, but he doesn't want to remain single? What a pervert. And he dares to tell the word about the depth of this perversion - wanting to find a mate! I remember I've read in some depraved book (I am sorry, but I must confess to reading this clearly pornographic pamphlet for the sake of discussion - I was young and reckless back then): "It is a truth universally acknowledged that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife" - but I never thought I would encounter a real-life example of such a monstrous creature myself. Why didn't you say it from the start? That alone would be the proof of all allegations and more.
I will say that in my romantic relationships I have always striven to tell the truth - phrases like "I can't live without you" are not things I ever said. My wife would either laugh hysterically or be offended at my lack of connection to reality if I resorted to that sort of baseless hyperbole.
I freely acknowledge that we're unusual in that regard. It's a big part of what attracted us to each other.
Apart from that, I have little else of value to add to the conversation. It's become obvious our perspectives are strongly divergent, and while I understand yours, you're pushing me away from accepting your conclusions rather than encouraging me towards them.
For clarity's sake, I'll add that it's clear the media did in fact misrepresent Stallma terribly, and I wish they had not. Several publications summarized his statements about Epstein exactly wrong. Whether that was malicious or incompetence I can't know.
That does not materially change my perception of events (I never believed the misreports of what he said, as I went straight to the leaked email thread), nor of Stallman's character (he has always struck me as a pedantic literalist who espouses high ideals but is mean and rude to actual people who don't align with his ideals).
I don't know the man personally at all, so that perception should be taken with the proverbial grain of salt. I might be entirely wrong.
You are a unique human specimen that sets the example for all of us, the shining light, the city on the hill. However, even from the heights of your perfection you should be aware that average humans do engage in courtship which involves saying stuff like that, exaggerating, saying silly and pompous things, etc. If you read any literature, seen any movies, have any non-paragon-of-virtue friends, etc. That's how us, regular humans, flirt. Sometimes (obviously, there's no single script for it). Presenting it as some sinister "threat" is unfair and, frankly, insane.
> he has always struck me as a pedantic literalist who espouses high ideals but is mean and rude to actual people
Yes, Stallman can be mean and rude. I had an occasion to personally interact with him, and he was mean and rude to me, though it didn't matter much and I am not going to claim I was scarred for life - I only remember it because it involved Stallman, otherwise I shrugged it off. However, it's not and should not be a basis of unpersoning campaign and a pileup he was a target of, and I think he was treated very unjustly, and him being mean and rude sometimes does not justify such treatment. What was done to him was very wrong. That's the point.
Oh horror! How can a man be so depraved, so devoid of any common decency, so enthralled to his animalistic desires as to ask out a MIT undergraduate! Who'd even think such thing is possible in our enlightened time. We all thought we are way past MIT undergrads being asked out, but here we go again.
So every male at MIT is creepy then.
> defending adults having sex with children.
He was just arguing about the science available at the moment and even links the study on his website (everything is still there, he is not hiding anything)
He was arguing using the science of the time.
Darwin believed that "males are more evolutionarily advanced than females" and manyany anthropologists contemporary to Darwin concluded that "women's brains were analogous to those of animals," which had "overdeveloped" sense organs "to the detriment of the brain"
Should we judge them for being wrong at the time, without knowing it?
Where's the outrage when we need it?
This is exactly the problem here. You, and many like you, are basically demonizing all men in MIT. For you, all men are guilty of being men and thus they should be removed.
Its incredible that society tolerates such discrimination. This is beyond fascism.
I was just being sarcastic and you are just overreacting.
If asking a girl out is sexual assault, then all men are sexual predators.
It's true even for girls, they ask men out, it's 2019 and I'm 43, I've seen much worse in my life than "asking a girl out".
BTW, they can still say no, it's ok to say no.
Because nobody knows them.
But if it is creepy for RMS, it is for anyone else who did it.
Where is the outrage?
Half their age is perfectly legit if one is 25 and the other is 50.
You should be more precise.
I believe most of the men in positions of some power and acclaim at MIT aren't asking undergrads out, and yes, those that are shouldn't be in that position of power and/or acclaim.
> yes, those that are shouldn't be in that position of power and/or acclaim.
Why not? What's bad in asking a female student out? Is it some sort of crime for males to date females? Is it something only low-level males not occupying any positions allowed to do? It is bad if someone tries to use their power to coerce a female to a date, but if he just asks, and the female is not dependent on him in any way and is free to refuse if she doesn't find him attractive - what exactly is the problem here?
Seriously?
Epstein was really well-esteemed.
Weinstein was very well-esteemed
Polansky was very well-esteemed
Ethan Zuckerman (MIT) was very well-esteemed
Stallman did nothing of the sort.
They are just legends built around a weird guy who comes out creepy when tries to be friendly.
And they started because he was not popular in college but usually right
People hate the outcasts that expose their faults in public
It ruins their projected image
It hurts their giant ego
BTW: I've been young and creepy sometimes to women, they've been creepy to me (one even stalked me and my girlfriend), most of the time we've been cool around each other.
"She said, he said" is a very bad way to evaluate a person in an objective way.
"They told me that one time" it's the beginning of everyone's life, when you are 66 and lived the life Stallman has lived, that one time, repeated over and over, becomes almost a truth.
It's like John Lennon saying "The best drummer in the world? Ringo is not even the best drummer in The Beatles"
Or Ozzy Osbourne eating bats
Or Van Halen's "no brown M&M's" rule
Plus the healthy snacks his feet provide
This is the kind of fearless leader we need in the software world.
I heard about advice given to some women to keep plants, so that he does not come. But that is not the same as story about Stallman harassing someone, it is story about people thinking he is creep, but no specific on anything he was supposed to do to women without plants (hope the difference is clear).
You are repeating defamatory rumours without a shred of evidence.
April Glaser on Twitter specifically talks about accusations against him: https://twitter.com/aprilaser/status/1174093253433380864
Here's the reality though, every woman who steps up and admits publicly is probably going to get harassed. Some fuckheads on the internet are going to bother her and harass them. I imagine the # of public complaints is going to be pretty low.
Somehow the definition of harassment used by a wide variety of people seems to be "I don't like his opinion" if I judge from the linked twitter post... If it goes forward this way I could picture people rallying in front of libraries and burning a lot of books. Would someone please enlighten me how "Lolita" is any less worse than RMS-ramblings?
That then also explains paragraph 3, since when you "step up" claiming you got harassed and it turns out you just disagree with the offendees opinion/behavior at large, you are harassed again by people disagreeing with you... This is kind of brain-dead but apparently a certain kind of reality happening on this planet called "earth"...
There was even a case in Melbourne where a slightly mentally impaired man was accused of sexual harassment because he’d try and be friendly to everyone and it came off wrong.
I’d like to think we’d have some amount of compassion for these people and help them function in society.
I too am autistic, and it does not excuse this behaviour. Yes people should have compassion and patience with neurodivergent people, and everyone has been with Stallman. This is not one incident, but a string of incidents that show an underlying pattern.
Exactly, it just looks like a joke, banter to lighten the situation. It all depends on context, that we don't have.
People really should find and pass around a link to a full writeup of that event rather than relaying rumours.
So am I and I often come off as awkward with a list of misinterpretations to the point of having a "do not interact with this person as they won't understand" list to avoid it.
His behaviour is typical of someone with an foot on the spectrum and I don't see too much oddity in his behaviour. He's obsessed with meaning of words, comes off the wrong way, seemingly no social manners by most standards yet it's incredibly consistent which hints to different interpretations of social interaction.
His behaviour isn't "problematic" in this case, rather, it's correct in a desire for exactness.
I heard this a lot - people on the spectrum damning Stallman. But isn't it called a spectrum for a reason?
Given the number of movies where this happens, i'd be very surprised that did not happen in reality from time to time, and that it is considered unacceptable.
I think whether something is or isn't acceptable very much depends on the people involved. Though, I also find it unacceptable, just like you.
In fact I have strong compassion for those calling it an aggression.
their life must be miserable if they can't take a simple thing like that.
It happened to me more than one time, one of them stalked me, I never called them "aggresive bitches", they just had a few problems expressing emotions, that's it and I calmly explained to them why we couldn't be together.
If you really are autistic, you should know what it means trying to be like everybody else when you're different.
In the ideal world any claim like this would be backed up with evidence.
No, he didn't.
Thomas Lord who worked with him says
> One remarkable thing about the FSF at that time, when we worked out of dinky spare offices on the campus of MIT, was the degree of participation by women. In the tiny society that was then the FSF, women were more prominent than I had seen in Silicon Valley, or acadamia prior. The general culture of inclusiveness and tolerance that RMS fostered meant that, at least when I was there alongside Bushnell, that social circle in and around the organization was feminized and all the stronger for it.
Of course he did (and does). It's well known. Here's HN from 11 days ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20979343
I have personally read, in the last few weeks, over a dozen statements by women who were driven out of FSF by Stallman.
I don't even move in those circles. There must be many more who don't feel like speaking up and getting harassed by all the neckbeards.
Richard Stallman, Knight for Justice - Also Hot Ladies
https://miro.medium.com/max/4080/1*lDSkAjF1958TpEafxuJsLg.jp...
And I've personally spoken with 4 of them that say the exact opposite.
Drop some name please, accusations need proof.
> I don't even move in those circles
I do.
> Richard Stallman, Knight for Justice - Also Hot Ladies
Old joke, stupid sign, nothing severe, it's been there forever together with the sticker of Amnesty International (if you haven't noticed), nobody complained for ages, suddenly high paid engineers that without GCC wouldn't have the same high paid job complain that RMS makes them feel uncomfortable, even though they "don't even move in those circles"
Let's be serious, please don't make me quote Roger Murtaugh.
The four that you know may not have attracted RMS' attention.
> Drop some name please, accusations need proof.
It's up to the alleged victims to go public, if they so wish, IMHO. (Though announcing un-sourced / anonymously-sourced claims isn't exactly a great thing either.)
so he can control himself.
He doesn't just throw himself at every woman that comes around.
Just like the rest of us...
> It's up to the alleged victims to go public
Fact is, I don't think they even exist.
Not because victims do no exist in general, but because at worse RMS has been weird or inappropriate, but dangerous, threatening, scary or violent?
It never happened.
I'm sure.
Let's see them then.
I'm sure there are real testimonies of real people.
For the moment, I recommend we stick to just legal standards. (Such as if he drugged/raped someone, the way Cosby and Weinstein did.)
What did he do, exactly?
Has he been convicted of something now?