Heh, I think you just uncovered a bit of hidden psychology I hadn't realized before. The part about "people put up with his childish insistence on doing things exactly his way" probably comes off as aspirational for a ton of people without realizing it. In fact, stallman hits a lot of things I'd say are probably aspirational: considered as a programming god (despite not really being involved in the technical side of the industry for at least a few decades), the ability to say whatever you want and get a pass because of who you are, getting acclaim for being an inflexible curmudgeon instead of being told to get with the times or adapt your core ideas to a changing world...who wouldn't want that kind of pass in society?

Total speculation, but it makes me wonder if stallman is the geek's version of Steinbeck's "temporarily embarrassed millionaire"; that people want to see themselves not as members of a society, but just undiscovered genius misanthropes whose greatness hasn't yet been recognized.

¯\_(ツ)_/¯