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Richard Stallman Has Been Vilified by Those Who Don’t Know Him

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Re: Richard Stallman Has Been Vilified by Those Who Don’t Know Him

#121

Post by remarkEon »

floatingatoll wrote: post #107
remarkEon wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Imagine the world if Stallman had been excommunicated from tech after the first awkward/offensive interaction he had with someone. I sure wouldn’t. Tangentially: I better not see anyone here lionize Steve Jobs ever again, because he inflicted actual physical trauma on people. He didn’t just piss them off with his failure to recognize social cues.

“The first” is neither what has happened with Stallman, nor is it what I describe in my comment. Many incidents have occurred, enough to demonstrate that they’re a trend rather than “the first” one-off. Many folks have noted that most people in Stallman’s position would have chose to learn to be better people to those around them. He did not make that choice, and the result is that many stories told about him paint h…

>Many incidents have occurred, enough to demonstrate that they’re a trend rather than “the first” one-off.

Are people deliberately ignoring the fact that his guy is mentally ill? You're ascribing neurotypical social requirements to someone who is demonstrably not capable of them, and then acting surprised when he breaches said decorum.

>Please don’t use threats here; “I better not see anyone here [any action here]” has no place in this forum’s conversations.

Actually my comment seems well in line with the general tone of this thread - which is either intentionally misleading about what actually a happened or willfully arrogant and dismissive about how people who struggle with mental illness can respond to the modern sociopolitical environment and its "requirements".

Re: Richard Stallman Has Been Vilified by Those Who Don’t Know Him

#122

Post by _skel »

His job, as the head of the FSF and GNU, was to represent those organizations to the public, which includes many people who don't know him. Being judged and vilified by people who don't know you is what happens to public figures.

If your behavior brings disrepute on the organizations you represent, you should let those organizations find different representatives. RMS was right to step down. He is still free to say whatever he wants as an individual without damaging the reputations of GNU and the FSF.

Re: Richard Stallman Has Been Vilified by Those Who Don’t Know Him

#123

Post by loeg »

vnth93 wrote: post #100
kelnos wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you have a condition where you have trouble interacting socially with people, while also running an influential organization and acting as its figurehead, you need to be able to mitigate these issues. If this means you have an assistant who you run emails by before sending them, so be it. If your assistant also takes a look at your office (given to you as a favor by a respected educational institution) and tells y…

If he had the capacity to comprehend any of this he wouldn't be the sort of person who talked about the Knight of Hot Ladies at work. Unless Garrett somehow turned out to be a some kind of medical expert, his opinion on Stallman is about valid as Stallman's on anyone else.

You don't have to be a doctor to diagnose asshole behavior.

Re: Richard Stallman Has Been Vilified by Those Who Don’t Know Him

#125

Post by journalctl »

marmada wrote: post #63
Pfhreak wrote: post #43

Dude has gone out of his way to make other people uncomfortable. I use singular they for my pronouns. He's so bothered by this that he goes out of his way to not only tell me I'm wrong for doing so, but to invent his own language for referring to folks who use gender neutral pronouns (which no one will understand, because it's not widely used). I would certainly question whether I was welcome at an event where he was…

I don't understand why his pronoun scheme is antagonistic. He still respects that you want gender neutral pronouns, he just won't use they because he thinks they has a standard plural meaning. I don't understand why people have an obligation to use "they" specifically as long as they respect the gender neutral concept.

Because one basic way of showing any respect at all for someone is calling them by their preferred name and pronouns. Refusing to do so suggests that you somehow know someone else better than they know themselves. If someone is that upset about it they can seethe elsewhere on their own time, but when interacting with someone, just use their preferred name/pronouns.

Re: Richard Stallman Has Been Vilified by Those Who Don’t Know Him

#126

Post by floatingatoll »

vnth93 wrote: post #92
floatingatoll wrote: post #8

Richard Stallman has been vilified by those who experienced him. His actions are reported to repeatedly exceed what is permissible without societal censure, regardless of the logic and/or reasoning behind them. Knowing him is not necessary to react to him, and to tell stories of his actions to others.

If his logic didnt matter, shouldnt he be condemned for only being inappropriate or hostile? Yet it seems that his current reputation among the public at large is that of an actual paedophilia/rape apologist. Whether he actually was or not, this lack of concern for subtleties is the very reason why "societal censure" should only be the authority on matters relating to politeness and not criminality.

I disagree. Societal censure is appropriate on the topics you declare exempt. It is appropriate to fear censure and exile from your society when caught to simply be considering such activities, even if no criminal action is occurs. They are societally unacceptable. If his historical actions and present words lead others to be concerned that he’s an apologist, it is appropriate to react societally.

Re: Richard Stallman Has Been Vilified by Those Who Don’t Know Him

#127

Post by tjpnz »

qzx_pierri wrote: post #65
chasing wrote: post #39

> He takes everything literally and doesn’t necessarily take feelings and the reactions of others into account when making statements that are outside the bounds of his expertise in free software. Whelp, then no one should be that surprised when people stop taking his feelings into account and decide they no longer want to be associated with him. Not being an asshole is a two-way street.

He’s autistic. Suddenly the people who were annoyingly vocal about being “inclusive” are forgetting Stallman’s disability. He says “creepy” things because he doesn’t understand social cues or casual communication at a certain level. Everyone in this thread demonizing RMS should be ashamed of themselves. This is the same reason why he can’t hold a relationship, or why he sleeps in his office. He’s just far out there -…

I've come to a very similar conclusion. Outrage culture does have a way of disproportionately targeting those on the spectrum as well as people who might suffer from ADHD/ADD. People who fall into those categories will often be a bit more impulsive when saying whatever's on their mind and will by definition have quite different ways of thinking about things. Simply telling one of these people to stop saying stupid things isn't going to work and makes the person come across as being just as ignorant.

Re: Richard Stallman Has Been Vilified by Those Who Don’t Know Him

#128

Post by BeetleB »

qzx_pierri wrote: post #65
chasing wrote: post #39

> He takes everything literally and doesn’t necessarily take feelings and the reactions of others into account when making statements that are outside the bounds of his expertise in free software. Whelp, then no one should be that surprised when people stop taking his feelings into account and decide they no longer want to be associated with him. Not being an asshole is a two-way street.

He’s autistic. Suddenly the people who were annoyingly vocal about being “inclusive” are forgetting Stallman’s disability. He says “creepy” things because he doesn’t understand social cues or casual communication at a certain level. Everyone in this thread demonizing RMS should be ashamed of themselves. This is the same reason why he can’t hold a relationship, or why he sleeps in his office. He’s just far out there -…

>He’s autistic.

I keep hearing this - has he ever been diagnosed?

Why do people keep saying this?

Re: Richard Stallman Has Been Vilified by Those Who Don’t Know Him

#129

Post by doubleunplussed »

kelnos wrote: post #84
qzx_pierri wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He’s autistic. Suddenly the people who were annoyingly vocal about being “inclusive” are forgetting Stallman’s disability. He says “creepy” things because he doesn’t understand social cues or casual communication at a certain level. Everyone in this thread demonizing RMS should be ashamed of themselves. This is the same reason why he can’t hold a relationship, or why he sleeps in his office. He’s just far out there -…

If you have a condition where you have trouble interacting socially with people, while also running an influential organization and acting as its figurehead, you need to be able to mitigate these issues. If this means you have an assistant who you run emails by before sending them, so be it. If your assistant also takes a look at your office (given to you as a favor by a respected educational institution) and tells y…

For what it's worth, since anyone can predict what Matthew Garrett's opinion on this was going to be, it is in the Bayesian sense very weak evidence for anything.

Re: Richard Stallman Has Been Vilified by Those Who Don’t Know Him

#130

Post by least »

Pfhreak wrote: post #43

Dude has gone out of his way to make other people uncomfortable. I use singular they for my pronouns. He's so bothered by this that he goes out of his way to not only tell me I'm wrong for doing so, but to invent his own language for referring to folks who use gender neutral pronouns (which no one will understand, because it's not widely used). I would certainly question whether I was welcome at an event where he was…

There are many third person pronouns that people have suggested that are not widely in use today, including singular they. Ze, zhe, per, zer, e, etc. [1] have all been proposed at various points in time (and some have resurfaced in the past several years) and there are people who identify by these pronouns. If singular 'they' is valid, then so are they (plural, referring to the alternative third person gender neutral pronouns in this case).

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third-person_pronoun#Preferred...

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