On Recent Controversial Events
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Re: On Recent Controversial Events
#2>human sexual behavior not a topic on which RMS has adequate expertise
Ouch!
Re: On Recent Controversial Events
#3What a thoughtful essay. Kuhn clearly pored over those words most carefully.
> The question is whether an organization should have a designated leader who is on a sustained, public campaign advocating about an unrelated issue that many consider controversial. It really doesn't matter what your view about the controversial issue is; a leader who refuses to stop talking loudly about unrelated issues eventually creates an untenable distraction from the radical activism you're actively trying to advance.
The inability to differentiate between "acute" and "chronic" plagues our day.
Re: On Recent Controversial Events
#4> In fact, RMS' views and statements posted on stallman.org about sexual morality escalated for the worse over the last few years.
Each word is a linked to a comment, some of them fairly eye opening.
Re: On Recent Controversial Events
#5>human sexual behavior not a topic on which RMS has adequate expertise Ouch!
Yeah that struck me as a "sick burn" too, or at least potentially could be taken as one, but the rest of the essay makes me think it was unintentional and more about being one of the people who study sexuality.
Re: On Recent Controversial Events
#6What a thoughtful essay. Kuhn clearly pored over those words most carefully. > The question is whether an organization should have a designated leader who is on a sustained, public campaign advocating about an unrelated issue that many consider controversial. It really doesn't matter what your view about the controversial issue is; a leader who refuses to stop talking loudly about unrelated issues eventually creates…
But then Kuhn gives the game away within a couple paragraphs, calling RMS's views 'problematic' and expressing disagreement with several of them.
If you're gonna go with that line, stay on-message.
Re: On Recent Controversial Events
#7What a thoughtful essay. Kuhn clearly pored over those words most carefully. > The question is whether an organization should have a designated leader who is on a sustained, public campaign advocating about an unrelated issue that many consider controversial. It really doesn't matter what your view about the controversial issue is; a leader who refuses to stop talking loudly about unrelated issues eventually creates…
But then Kuhn gives the game away within a couple paragraphs, calling RMS's views 'problematic' and expressing disagreement with several of them. If you're gonna go with that line, stay on-message.
It is possible that there are multiple angles and reasons why a leader is no longer compatible, and that there is no 'game' to give away.
EDIT: What I mean is, it's entirely possible that its not just that Stallman had views that were disagreeable, nor that Stallman wouldn't stop talking about his personal views- its that Stallman wouldn't stop talking about his specifically disagreeable personal viewpoints.
Re: On Recent Controversial Events
#8> In fact, RMS' views and statements posted on stallman.org about sexual morality escalated for the worse over the last few years. Each word is a linked to a comment, some of them fairly eye opening.
Except reading the links and keeping the timestamps in mind pretty much the opposite occurred. In 2016 he was blabbing about bestiality and pedophilia / rape of minors and excusing it, but later on he was mostly talking about not calling 18yos children, and saying that not all 'Sexual assault' is equal and different words should be used to describe different actions, he even provides a pretty logical argument for this.
His worst comment was probably this one https://web.archive.org/web/20180131020215/https://stallman....
Re: On Recent Controversial Events
#9Earlier quoted context omitted.
But then Kuhn gives the game away within a couple paragraphs, calling RMS's views 'problematic' and expressing disagreement with several of them. If you're gonna go with that line, stay on-message.
It is possible that there are multiple angles and reasons why a leader is no longer compatible, and that there is no 'game' to give away. EDIT: What I mean is, it's entirely possible that its not just that Stallman had views that were disagreeable, nor that Stallman wouldn't stop talking about his personal views- its that Stallman wouldn't stop talking about his specifically disagreeable personal viewpoints.
Absolutely possible and I don't have a hard time believing they'd reached that point with RMS.
I hadn't seen RMS's politics link before -- he puts out like 10 bullet-point hot takes a day, lots of them with a viewpoint way outside the mainstream. He's got weirdo semanticist takes about basically everything, including, as infamously linked, sex laws.
I normally want to defend the right to have unorthodox takes on general principle, but I can see where they're coming from here as far as leadership.
Re: On Recent Controversial Events
#10> The question is whether an organization should have a designated leader who is on a sustained, public campaign advocating about an unrelated issue that many consider controversial.
I don't understand this. Are people in prominent positions not allowed to have opinions or interests outside of their job? As long as RMS wasn't actively using his power/influence as head of the FSF to advance his odd-ball views I really don't see what the problem is. The only argument I could see is that RMS's persona was so fundamentally quintessential to the FSF that the two could not be separated -- in which case firing him was obviously a boneheaded move.