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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

#311

Post by dependenttypes »

ineedasername wrote: post #165
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 -…

You make it sound as though autistic people are unable to learn appropriate social behavior. That is not only false, it does an extreme disservice to the entire community of people on the spectrum.

As a non-neurotypical person, I will have to honestly say that teaching autistic people ""appropriate"" social behavior is comparable to abuse, steaming from the unwillingness of neurotypical to accept something that is not them and consider logic above their feelings for once.

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

#312

Post by watwut »

asveikau wrote: post #146
sp332 wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is bull. He had decades to learn not to make women uncomfortable by doing one single thing - calling his business card his "pleasure" card when he handed it to a woman - and he still does that. That's not autism. Autism might hypothetically lead to doing that until someone pulled him aside and told him it was creepy and made others uncomfortable. After that it's just being an asshole.

> Autism might hypothetically lead to doing that until someone pulled him aside and told him it was creepy and made others uncomfortable. It's not with autism, but I have first hand experience telling a mentally ill person (diagnosis was schizoaffective) that certain behavior is creepy and made women uncomfortable. They didn't listen. They argued it with me very intensely instead. In some cases part of the illness is…

Such person is then not suitable for leadership position nor any position where communication matters. The way leaders interact trickle down and creates culture. People mimic leaders more then we care to admit.

And when you put such person in position where women have choice between leaving and being undermined by his behavior or being insulted or have to work around potential danger to reputation etc or what it is that he was doing, you are in fact disadvantaging women in that organization. You dont get to claim there is no sexism here nor claim that it is all meritocracy nor fair nor babble about natural self selection.

It makes not just women leave, it makes men who dont care about being members of such culture to leave.

For the record, a person that mistreats males would be same case.

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

#313

Post by noobermin »

aonsager wrote: post #101
baron_harkonnen wrote: post #72

We are, sadly, entering a new age of conformity. Aligning yourself with what main stream society thinks is correct is now more important than anything else. The response of course is that "bad behavior should never be excused, regardless of ability!" which leads to a losing argument in which we try to say what kind of good excuses what kind of bad. But this presupposes the conformist stance: that fitting in with the…

Yes there is a benefit to radical thinking and nonconformity, but "do it without hurting others" is a reasonable line to draw. Stallman was viewed as a toxic individual who caused harm, and this is what our society is trying to weed out. I still believe, perhaps naively, that it's possible to maintain not-normal opinions without causing pain to the people around you. And this is something that everyone needs to do, w…

This flattening needs to stop. RMS didn't harm anyone, he stated odious opinions most people disagree with. There is, in addition to the email thread, accusations of past toxic behavior. The article these comments are attached to dispute that or at least suggest that it may in part be due to him being neuroatypical. In fact, it directly disputes one of those anecdotes regarding a sexual joke attached to his door. This aside, I've heard enough he-said-she-said-they-said to feel like I really don't know the full story wrt actually toxic behavior beyond rms merely being unpleasant and pedantic, and it probably isn't fair at this point to make a call on it.

I'll repeat what I said above, this is why his ouster should have been through a fair hearing rather than in a hurried response to public intrigue.

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

#314

Post by kragen »

amp108 wrote: post #181
megous wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why just women?

> Why just women? Because they are the people who have been made uncomfortable by his behavior. If it were men, or also men, I'm sure the parent post would have read "men or women". This is not an abstract case, so implying that somehow men are underrepresented when dealing with a person whose (alleged) behavior has been targeted at women sounds a little petty. Imagine someone is accused of abusing children, and the…

Stallman has made everyone uncomfortable. Have you ever met the guy? But that's not a good excuse for firing him.

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

#315

Post by mirimir »

strenholme wrote: post #287
jl6 wrote: post #279

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What’s considered toxic about the free love movement?

It normalized the objectification of women [1] and allowed sexual predators [2] to flourish. [1] Objectification: instead of treating a woman like a person, they were reduced to being a body to satisfy a man’s base urges. [2] Sexual predator: Men who do not care about women as human beings but merely see them as potential sexual conquests, and who do dishonest and manipulative stuff to get a woman to have sex with th…

I was there, and part of it.

You may find it hard to believe, but there were lots of young women who were just extremely promiscuous. Just as promiscuous as the young men were. Free sex was a political statement. A form of rebellion against the status quo. And of course, it was enabled by the ready availability of antibiotics and hormonal birth control.

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

#316

Post by kragen »

Arnt wrote: post #289
jplayer01 wrote: post #247

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Frankly, Bushnell and the response to him clearly show none of this should be decided in the court of public opinion. Even if either of these people are correct, none of what we've read or heard so far is in any way sufficient to condemn Stallmann and ruin his career and none of us is in an appropriate position to make that determination. He underwent utter character assassination in the media who went to great lengt…

The first I heard was about how he was a guest in Denmark almost 30 years ago and fouled up his room. Nothing bad happened to him, he was lucky. Stallman had luck with public opinion many, many times. This time his luck changed. It's unfair to deplore the bad luck and forget about all the times he had benefited from good luck.

Fouled up his room? What do you mean, like, he couldn't figure out how to operate the hotel room door lock?

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

#317

Post by eropple »

fdsa_asdf_asdf wrote: post #254
aonsager wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes there is a benefit to radical thinking and nonconformity, but "do it without hurting others" is a reasonable line to draw. Stallman was viewed as a toxic individual who caused harm, and this is what our society is trying to weed out. I still believe, perhaps naively, that it's possible to maintain not-normal opinions without causing pain to the people around you. And this is something that everyone needs to do, w…

> "do it without hurting others" is a reasonable line to draw No, it's really not. If we want to say "without physically, financially or maybe emotionally in an extreme way" then yes. If we're talking about having healthy debate while making sure no one's feelings get hurt then we are truly and totally fucked. Also, you can't make a worthwhile argument and use politically charged words like "toxic". What the fuck doe…

If you're gonna get that salty about "manliness", it's probably good form to use your actual account. You know. To be manly, while you're calling people sick for having a bit of decency to them.

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

#318

Post by mirimir »

input_sh wrote: post #306
strenholme wrote: post #243

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thank you for the link. My impression is that RMS mainly had some opinions which were leftover from the “free love” movement of the 1960s and 1970s which were not particularly shocking or out of line back then, but are considered job-losing toxic opinions here in 2019. For the record, as someone who saw that whole movement first hand, I disagree with the whole “free love” movement and think sex should only be done in…

> [P]rostitution, adultery, necrophilia, bestiality, possession of child pornography, and even incest and pedophilia ... should be legal as long as no one is coerced. They are illegal only because of prejudice and narrowmindedness. June 28th 2003: http://stallman.org/archives/2003-may-aug.html > I am skeptical of the claim that voluntarily pedophilia harms children. The arguments that it causes harm seem to be based…

Damn, he actually wrote that under his real name? That was unwise. I wouldn't even say that as Mirimir. Except about prostitution and adultery, of course.

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

#319

Post by watwut »

dependenttypes wrote: post #311
ineedasername wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You make it sound as though autistic people are unable to learn appropriate social behavior. That is not only false, it does an extreme disservice to the entire community of people on the spectrum.

As a non-neurotypical person, I will have to honestly say that teaching autistic people ""appropriate"" social behavior is comparable to abuse, steaming from the unwillingness of neurotypical to accept something that is not them and consider logic above their feelings for once.

Autistic people do not actually interact in logical way. They are unaware of own emotions and unaware of other peoples emotions. Their behavior or opinions are not more logical nor more correct. Angry yelling autistic is as illogical as angry neurotypical. Just because autistic is totally convinced he or she is super right, does not make it so. Just because neurotypical do not share autistic preference does not make him illogical, does not make his code "objectively" shitty or crappy. It does not make non-autistic illogical to not keep same routine nor to unintentionally disrupt autistic routine. No matter how much autistic calls neurotypical doing something different as yesterday stupid or irrational.

I agree that neurotypical should accept autistic needs and personalities, but not to the point that they allow themselves to be bullied. And vice versa.

Autistic people do have feelings and react to them. Quite strongly. Autistic do get insulted too.

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

#320

Post by trhway »

input_sh wrote: post #306
strenholme wrote: post #243

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thank you for the link. My impression is that RMS mainly had some opinions which were leftover from the “free love” movement of the 1960s and 1970s which were not particularly shocking or out of line back then, but are considered job-losing toxic opinions here in 2019. For the record, as someone who saw that whole movement first hand, I disagree with the whole “free love” movement and think sex should only be done in…

> [P]rostitution, adultery, necrophilia, bestiality, possession of child pornography, and even incest and pedophilia ... should be legal as long as no one is coerced. They are illegal only because of prejudice and narrowmindedness. June 28th 2003: http://stallman.org/archives/2003-may-aug.html > I am skeptical of the claim that voluntarily pedophilia harms children. The arguments that it causes harm seem to be based…

man, taken seriously most of it does sound awfully wrong of course, no argument here. Yet about taking it seriously - this is the quote that follows yours a bit later :

" Necrophilia would be my second choice for what should be done with my corpse, the first being scientific or medical use. Once my dead body is no longer of any use to me, it may as well be of some use to someone. "

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