Some of his previous comments on child sex issues are republished here:

https://www.thedailybeast.com/famed-mit-computer-scientist-r...

Including gems such as

"I think that everyone age 14 or above ought to take part in sex, though not indiscriminately. (Some people are ready earlier.)”

And

“I am skeptical of the claim that voluntarily pedophilia harms children. The arguments that it causes harm seem to be based on cases which aren't voluntary, which are then stretched by parents who are horrified by the idea that their little baby is maturing.”

Plus

“There is little evidence to justify the widespread assumption that willing participation in pedophilia hurts children.”

He has all of the sudden backtracked on his decades long-held opinion that sex between adults and children is ok less than two weeks ago:

https://stallman.org/archives/2019-jul-oct.html#14_September...

He changed his opinion in 2016 actually, not two weeks ago: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Biograp...

> “There is little evidence to justify the widespread assumption that willing participation in pedophilia hurts children.”

This is quoted out of content, here is the full quote: "There is little evidence to justify the widespread assumption that willing participation in pedophilia hurts children. [with a link to https://www.theguardian.com/society/2013/jan/03/paedophilia-...]

Granted, children may not dare say no to an older relative, or may not realize they could say no; in that case, even if they do not overtly object, the relationship may still feel imposed to them. That's not willing participation, it's imposed participation, a different issue."

He did not take the "There is little evidence to justify the widespread assumption that willing participation in pedophilia hurts children" statement out of his butt, it was the conclusion that he formed after reading this article.

But even then, I do not see how his opinions regarding paedophilia are relevant to the topic at hand.

So everything these days is a spectrum, except age of consent, which starts at 18 and not at 17 and 364 days, why?

Most rape laws do recognize a spectrum: in the teens, it is generally not rape if the two people are close enough in age.

That is relevant but does nothing to explain why say Sweden put the line at 16 while the US has it at 18. It also happens to be the exact opposite for driving a car, ie the age requirement is 18 while in the US it is 16.

Personally I find the age when the brain is fully developed to carry a bit more significance, ie around age 25. Before that the brain is still being assembled and yet we expect people to make life or death decisions while driving, serving the military, have correct impulse control and follow the law just as everyone else.

There are European countries where it's 14 too!

Because that's what the law says. You can't vote at 17 years and 364 days either. (Or drive at 15 years and 364 days.)

What would a "spectrum of consent" even look like? 'First base' at one age, second at another, etc.?

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baseball_metaphors_for_sex

The law used also used to say it was illegal for gay people to marry and black people had to use separate bathrooms. That black people are worth 3/5 of a normal person. So don't even start with that "but it's the law!" drivel, we are talking about morality here.

It would look like romeo and juliet laws that allow consent between two teens close in age.

..but Romeo was over 18 and Juliet was like 13. That's statutory rape!

It's the letter of the law and that's why the above quoted position (or see below) is indefensible?

RMS: "I think that everyone age 14 or above ought to take part in sex, though not indiscriminately. (Some people are ready earlier.)”

Just because it's the letter of the law doesn't mean we are forbidden from discussing changing it.

If people's personal stories and experiences aren't "evidence," then indeed you should just look at his written words, which include such gems as taking a charitable stance toward pedophilia (recanted very recently, after maintaining it as a public position for some decades), his repeated public "emacs virgin" bit, his stated belief that people with down syndrome should be aborted, his habit of giving out "pleasure cards" to colleagues and people he's met at conferences.

A game of telephone takes place that distorts these stories by the time they get read by us. (Not to mention the memory distortions, my memory is probably not mch worse than anyone elses but I still notice myself misremembering things in favour of some narrative a lot)

Also, I can't speak for everyone, but I don't particulalry disagree with or think any of the things you list in your comment are fireable.

Not fireable, for a rank-and-file worker in an organization? Sure, I can see that.

Not fireable, for the public role of leader of an organization? They're held to higher standards of conduct, whether we like it or not;

holding forth in public on opinions that 1) run counter to mainstream society in a way that's going to piss off a lot of people and 2) have nothing to do with the organization are a distraction, and a sign that leader's losing the thread on what their organization goals are and how to accomplish that.

In short, you can lead a software advocacy organization, or you can publish your opinions on aborting fetuses with down syndrome and your skepticism about pedophilia harming children, but you can't do both for long. (Unless you're stallman, then you can do it for decades before someone says, "hey, this guy's making the free software movement look bad".)