They don't want to pay their engineers to work on Red Hat only to have some free forks follow the work, so they came up with the idea of eliminating and likely blacklisting customers who look like are there just to pick up changes for a fork.

Red Hat should be applauded for trying to find a business model which is compatible with copyleft, yet prevents freeloading.

Stallman never wanted to create a license that was anti-business, that's why this kind of thing is possible. A license which says you cannot drop or blacklist customers for any reason wouldn't be a free license.

There is an abundance of distros out there; anyone who doesn't like Red Hat for any reason can easily use something else.

It will be interesting to see whether Red Hat's ploy works out in the long run. Will it help grow their business, or will it turn out to be detrimental due to a backlash effect. Obviously, some people don't like it; it's a question of are there enough of them to matter.

There is also the question of whether a free fork of Red Hat that people can develop and test with without becoming paying Red Hat customers really is bad for Red Hat (as they are obviously convinced) or whether it is actually good.

Trade law in Europe works like exactly that: you do not get to choose your clients; you either have to serve anyone that is willing to pay, or no one at all. The US should definitely adopt this principle.

I don't even like this. Shoplifters should all go to prison, but once they've paid their debt to society and been rehabilitated, they should be allowed to do everything that law-abiding citizens can do, including going back as a legitimate customer to stores that they previously stole from.

It does, in some ways? Your business can't discriminate based on protected characteristics, like race.

Many customers aren't wanted, even if they happen to have money to spend.

I do really disagree on this. If somebody tells you "you are allowed to do X", not punishing you when you do X is clearly stated.