We're talking in English about Stallman's idiosyncratic English pronouns. What other language did you have in mind when you wrote Apache helicopter gunship?

The pronoun associated with a gunship is "it", I have no problem referring to people as "it" if that's what it prefers.

Of course you'll agree. You will do it for two reasons: 1) you are a nice person and would like to be polite, avoiding offending anyone, 2) if you fail to do so, there are people who will make sure you'll regret your decision.

Would you please stop posting flamewar comments? It's not what this site is for, and it destroys what it is for. You've posted dozens of them in the last 24 hours alone. This is not cool.

Moreover, using HN primarily for ideological or political battle is one line at which we start banning accounts—regardless of what they're battling for or against—and it looks like your account is well over that line. If you'd please review https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and use HN as intended, we'd appreciate it. There's lots more explanation here: https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comme...

I just realized I might have been guilty of that, too. In general, I try as best as I can to avoid these discussions as they seem counterproductive, but it's a bit more difficult regarding the recent RMS issue. This is Hacker News, and he is the hacker. Literally one of the main characters in Levy's famous book. And independently from valid criticism, he's now under flood of accusations, some of them being false. Not because I read something, but knowing RMS personally I know they are false. That's why it's sometimes hard to resist answering a comment or two. I really appreciate your work and I'm sorry if I cause any trouble by that.

The comment you replied to seems to be about what Stallman said. ("You might feel the line between innocent mistake and maliciousness has not been crossed. Other people do disagree.") It certainly was about names and pronouns. Not a variation on a tired transphobic straw man meme.[1]

[1] https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/i-sexually-identify-as-an-att...

You didn't provide criticism, you made a word meme. There's a big difference. Your reaction does not add to this discourse and furthermore I'd say it damages it.

Consider this: If I disagree with the sentiment that "if a trans person is offended, then it is transphobic" and someone reads your reactionary comment, guess how much more work I have to do to positively engage with someone? The answer is a lot. Said another way, your reactionary statement justifies someone else's extremism.

If you cannot debate people positively, maturely, and without reaching for tools like reactionary statements or sarcasm then please just sit the conversation out.