Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Joint Statement on the GNU Project

guix.gnu.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

121–130 of 310 posts

Re: Joint Statement on the GNU Project

#121

Post by dtornabene »

falcolas wrote: post #115
dtornabene wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

the ability for women to be able to contribute and simply be a part of the free software community without harrassment does not fall under "no real bearing on the project", just so we're clear here.

Unless I'm dramatically misreading all the various articles, only a few women that were directly approached by Stallman for a romantic encounter felt discouraged. This did not impact a vast majority of the women who have, and do, contribute to GNU projects. Yeah, he fucked up in approaching those women and making them uncomfortable. However, a couple of data points do not a trend make.

I'm not sure how you're getting any kind of round statistics here. especially since its well known that most people who suffer harassment never report it, never say anything, for precisely the reasons being demonstrated on this thread today. And that was only one of the things wrong with that post, another being: people who choose to take a stand on harassment are somehow going to be mediocrities compared to stallman.

Re: Joint Statement on the GNU Project

#122

Post by shadowgovt »

wott wrote: post #89
jordigh wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We can be friendly without having to compromise freedom. We don't have to be friendly to those who would want to use our software to take freedom away from others. We should be friendly to everyone who wants to use our software freely, regardless of their skill level. My view is that GNU should be working towards making sure we can get our software into as many people as possible by giving it an attractive interface,…

And your first friendly act is to 'friendly' take control of the organisation someone else built to host you. That opens a whole perspective of refreshing friendlyism.

"Organizations" are a two-way street. A leader with no followers isn't "an organization;" it's just another solo project on Github.

Re: Joint Statement on the GNU Project

#123

Post by kennywinker »

gfosco wrote: post #102
kennywinker wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I come to your house for dinner, and am an asshole to you and your family, do we need to get the law involved or should you just not invite me over for dinner again?

They shouldn't invite you over for dinner again, but it ends there. They don't get to come for your job, your career, your legacy.

Right, so if the assholery happens at work then the equivalent of "shouldn't invite you over for dinner again" is being asked not to come back to work.

Re: Joint Statement on the GNU Project

#124

Post by otterley »

dx87 wrote: post #105
otterley wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's already been publicized ad nauseum by others in the past few weeks. I don't think the authors owe anyone any duty to reiterate it.

Considering that a big chunk of what was publicized was lies and deliberate misquotes, I think it'd be best if the GNU project said specifically what their issues are.

At this point the truth or falsity of the minutiae, or whether the conclusions are fair or not are irrelevant. Once a former leader no longer has the political capital to be seen as effective, or their involvement proves to be a greater distraction than it's worth, no more needs to be said.

Re: Joint Statement on the GNU Project

#125

Post by kennywinker »

rowanG077 wrote: post #117
kennywinker wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're literally doing what you describe. Throwing away a bunch of people at the first sign of an action you disagree with.

These people are not in any way the leaders of a group I belong to. I'm not part of GNU. So I'm not doing the same thing at all.

Sorry, I should have said "writing off" not "throwing away"

Re: Joint Statement on the GNU Project

#126

Post by blub »

canarypilot wrote: post #93

The only joy I get from these threads is in watching a whole bunch of newbies to GNU get upset that politics, social policy, and GNU are intertwined. They have always been! You could at least have the dignity to read Stallman’s writings (a fine start is available at: https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/essays-and-articles.html , a more advanced diet is available at Stallman.org ) to understand just how politically charged…

There's no one in that project that is such a fanatic and well-known personality that they'd be able to lead it.

After being embraced, extended and diluted by corporations, software freedom will slide even more into irrelevance.

This also doesn't seem to be a discussion, it's a statement towards Stallman to GTFO.

Re: Joint Statement on the GNU Project

#127

Post by ibeckermayer »

canarypilot wrote: post #93

The only joy I get from these threads is in watching a whole bunch of newbies to GNU get upset that politics, social policy, and GNU are intertwined. They have always been! You could at least have the dignity to read Stallman’s writings (a fine start is available at: https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/essays-and-articles.html , a more advanced diet is available at Stallman.org ) to understand just how politically charged…

> Why should any social and political movement remain beholden to one original star of the old guard as the world moves forward.

The real question here isn't whether GNU should be political (all institutions are political), but whether the world is really "moving forward".

Re: Joint Statement on the GNU Project

#128

Post by oknenavin »

dtornabene wrote: post #72

For anyone coming to this, I can't speak for all of the people on that list, but the ones that I've met personally, over a decade now in the free software world, are decent caring people actually following the creed of freedom to its rightful conclusion . The idea that this is a "witchhunt" is absurd.

Could you tell us something more about emacs? Decent caring people is not the same as decent creative people.

Re: Joint Statement on the GNU Project

#129

Post by dragonwriter »

rowanG077 wrote: post #35
nrclark wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That "disgusting bunch of people" wrote a ton of the underlying software that powers the internet. You might not like them, but show a little respect.

I don't show respect to people that throw their leader under the bus at the first sign of trouble. They have achieved some cool technical stuff but that is no excuse for being a sad sack of a human.

> I don't show respect to people that throw their leader under the bus at the first sign of trouble.

If they had done that, Stallman would have been gone decades ago.

Re: Joint Statement on the GNU Project

#130

Post by shadowgovt »

blub wrote: post #99
shadowgovt wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If that's your concern, I recommend reading up further on people's issues with rms. It's not "some accusations that appeared after 20 years," it's 30 years of pattern. https://medium.com/@selamjie/remove-richard-stallman-appendi...

Utterly destroying a person's reputation should come with a damn high burden of proof. That article would be laughed out of any courtroom. Reading that has been a complete waste of time. To save everyone else some effort: 1. The man has problematic opinions. Welcome to democracy, where people with uncomfortable opinions are free to hold and discuss them. This is healthy. 2. He used a bad pick-up line, saying he'll ki…

You don't seem to be arguing the facts; you seem to be arguing whether the facts as arrayed should be considered damaging to a person's reputation.

To give a bad analogy, you're not criticizing the claim that what he said is what he said, you're just classifying it as "locker room talk."

Post reply on HN