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Joint Statement on the GNU Project

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161–170 of 310 posts

Re: Joint Statement on the GNU Project

#161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You've whipped up quite a strawman to get angry at, do you have any proof of this conspiracy?

of course they don't. because there isn't any . These people, some of whom, like Andy Wingo and Chris Webber, have been doing this for well over a decade. its asinine.

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Re: Joint Statement on the GNU Project

#162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm going to go with: So women can participate without having to be asked out on dates? So they don't feel harassed? You want to run cover for people do it in your own org man. This is beyond obtuse.

This answer has nothing to do with the questions I proposed. I'm asking why these people who proclaim to be as good as or better than Stallman are only now stepping up. What Stallman's dirty laundry is has been thoroughly discussed.

"these people" have been in free software for decades champ. I met Chris Webber in chicago, at free software events literally 10 years ago. Andy Wingo is similarly long term involved. Keep eliding everything actually about this to throw up straw men. Its clarifying, as I noted in another thread. And, his "dirty laundry" is driving women out of spaces supposedly dedicated to freedom. Not sure why thats so difficult.

Re: Joint Statement on the GNU Project

#163
post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are lots of us who care. We can preserve software freedom with the same stubborn, uncompromising attitude without having to also alienate the very people we wish to help.

you are reframing (weakening) the OP's standard. the standard is not "care", it's "gave as much of a fuck about software and personal freedom as Stallman did/does". RMS used an absolute garbage computer because it was, in his words: > the only laptop one could buy that could run a free initialization program and a free operating system. i'm certainly not taking it on some contributor's word that these 20 or so odd pe…

I completely agree with you. Moreover, I witnessed the same scenario in other projects, and it always ended the same way: once the charismatic leader was eliminated, people gradually lost motivation and everything dwindled. When people realized it was not worth it, it was already too late. Now that we lost Stallman it will be extremely hard to find a person even remotely as principled as he was.

Re: Joint Statement on the GNU Project

#164
post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can tell you for a fact that Chris Webber, one of the signers on that list, does indeed give a fuck about personal freedom as much as stallman does. Indeed it is precisely because these people believe in such freedom that they are standing up for the women who no one has chosen to listen to and its beyond gross the reaction of every fool who's never so much as filed a bug report or attended a meeting spewing out ha…

I really don't hate these people, especially not Andy Wingo. But if the likes of him or Chris Webber were to assume leadership of the GNU project, they would be one minor slip-up away from being purged themselves.

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Re: Joint Statement on the GNU Project

#165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

So, statistics. Allow me to fabricate a few number using some well known ballparking methods. In November of 2010, 4,600 people contributed to GNU. If we follow the 1-9-90 rule of speaking out, for every 1 woman who went to the authorities, 9 women have spoken out publicly, and, 90 others have not. I'm aware of 6-7 who have gone public with their accusations, and none who went to the authorities. As such, it seems sa…

Statistics is statics, but do you know someone rejecting something valuable because of the gender? How is harassment defined in this respect?

Re: Joint Statement on the GNU Project

#166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

If the nicest thing we can say about a leader of an organization is that most women were not harassed by him because they didn't get to meet him , then maybe it's time to look for a leader who is, you know, capable of actually meeting people without creeping them out.

No, the nicest thing we can say about the leader of this organization is that he lead it with principles around free software that nobody else can match. That he has been outright prescient in his outlook on what will happen as corporations disrespect the rights of users via their software.

He created the free software movement, created GNU. We're standing on his shoulders, only now (after 20+ years of standing on his shoulders) caring that yeah, he's not a perfect person we had hoped for.

Re: Joint Statement on the GNU Project

#167
post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Have we really stopped being human beings at this point? Does even truth even matter anymore or just the shouts getting most retweets?

Re: Joint Statement on the GNU Project

#168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So, statistics. Allow me to fabricate a few number using some well known ballparking methods. In November of 2010, 4,600 people contributed to GNU. If we follow the 1-9-90 rule of speaking out, for every 1 woman who went to the authorities, 9 women have spoken out publicly, and, 90 others have not. I'm aware of 6-7 who have gone public with their accusations, and none who went to the authorities. As such, it seems sa…

good to know that you're cool with harassment if it doesn't cross a certain numerical threshold. Clarifying.

What part of "Yeah, he fucked up in approaching those women and making them uncomfortable" and "It's still too high a number" consists being "cool with harassment"?

FWIW, I will not be responding to you any further, as your comments seem to have devolved into personal attacks.

Re: Joint Statement on the GNU Project

#169

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".

Do you object to “moving” or “forward”? If the former, I disagree; I see new battlegrounds emerging for free software and the developers and users of free software. Many of these new battlegrounds are commercial as we voluntarily hand over our data to opaque computing platforms, some are societal as we redefine how we expect work to be done, and who we expect to do it.

If the latter, it doesn’t hurt my argument for you to pretend I never used the word forward at all, and I’m very happy for you to do so. Our common ground here is that things feel as though they are changing.

Many great leaders are as much a product of their time and circumstances as they are a reflection of their innate talents. Whether you see the world progressing or regressing you might still agree that Stallman is not necessarily effective in the current climate.

Re: Joint Statement on the GNU Project

#170
post #126

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.

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

Ignorance of the fame and effectiveness of several people on that list says more about your awareness of the current state of the FSF and GNU than it does about those organizations.

Werner Koch led FSFE. Ian Jackson led Debian and SPI. Matt Lee is responsible for many of the FSF's major publicity campaigns. Joshua Gay put together Stallman's book. I don't volunteer any of them or have any knowledge of whether they want to run the project, but any of them easily could.

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