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Richard Stallman is coming back to the board of the FSF

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Re: Richard Stallman is coming back to the board of the FSF

#771

Post by gotostatement »

nostrademons wrote: post #297
gotostatement wrote: post #226

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not to derail the conversation but I find it amusing to put sexual harassment in the same sentence as not paying rent

I find it amusing that I can't tell whether you mean sexual harassment is dramatically more serious than not paying rent or not paying rent is dramatically more serious than sexual harassment. Both examples - really all of the examples other than "selling drugs to children", which is from Breaking Bad - are taken from real-world conversations with people that basically said "What a jerk!" The person complaining about…

not worth getting into the nitty gritty but I'll just say that I mean sexual harassment is dramatically more serious than not paying rent

Re: Richard Stallman is coming back to the board of the FSF

#772

Post by pratio »

john4532452 wrote: post #654
nostrademons wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ribbonfarm called this a couple years ago: https://www.ribbonfarm.com/2018/03/06/a-quick-battle-field-g... Specifically battlefront #8. He calls it consequential because the the neurodivergent/PC conflict highlights an inherent paradox in the PC worldview. Most applications of political correctness focus (at least on the surface) on defending a marginalized group against the verbal attacks of a privileged one. When a…

Its important to emphasis one thing about Ribbonfarm. The author wholly supports for Hindu caste system. This is where his arguments come from.

Do you have a source for this?

Re: Richard Stallman is coming back to the board of the FSF

#773

Post by CRConrad »

tw04 wrote: post #545
franga2000 wrote: post #531

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does it tho? There's definitely a difference between having sex with a 17yo when you think it's consentual without knowing someone else is forcing her in the background vs. forcing her yourself. Although I personally don't believe it, it is theoretically possible that Minsky didn't know - pointing that out, especially when very little information was available, seems at worst insensitive, but sounds mainly like a ver…

Minsky was an obese, balding old man. To imply that he should have expected or not had even a tiny bit of concern that an attractive young woman on a private island was throwing herself at him is ridiculous. https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/lomkCENpPXufPOLUkw6mzlgBljQ=... If I were in my 60s and a 17 year old child was throwing themselves at me for sex, I would question what was going on. The fact it was on a private…

> I'll just say this HN: shame on you. The fact there are so many people here willing to defend someone that was participating in sex trafficking is pretty disgusting.

What's really disgusting, though, is your calling Richard Stallman "someone that was participating in sex trafficking" -- because that's whom the HN community is defending here.

Re: Richard Stallman is coming back to the board of the FSF

#774

Post by zackees »

tw04 wrote: post #539
dkersten wrote: post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The worst part is that the blog post that started a lot of that literally quoted RMS one sentence and the rephrased it as something completely different in the very next sentence. And nobody called them out for it. He basically just said "Minsky may not have known because Epstein most likely forced the girl into acting as if her was willing" (paraphrased from memory) and it got turned into "RMS said the girl was will…

What Stallman said verbatim: >The word “assaulting” presumes that he applied force or violence, in some unspecified way, but the article itself says no such thing. Only that they had sex. >We can imagine many scenarios, but the most plausible scenario is that she presented herself to him as entirely willing. Assuming she was being coerced by Epstein, he would have had every reason to tell her to conceal that from mos…

> We'll set aside for a moment that he's trying to argue the only way that sexual assault can occur is if the attacker literally assaults the victim.

So was it figurative assault or do words not have literal meaning anymore?

Re: Richard Stallman is coming back to the board of the FSF

#775

Post by gotostatement »

monsieurbanana wrote: post #284
gotostatement wrote: post #226

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not to derail the conversation but I find it amusing to put sexual harassment in the same sentence as not paying rent

And this is why nothing can ever be safely said on internet without putting huge disclaimers everywhere. "/!\ I do not mean to liken sexual harassment to rent default /!\".

Yeah I mean, it's not exactly a huge leap of logic based on reading the post. If it's a misunderstanding, that's just one of the perils of written communication, and this gives the author a chance to reply. The societal role of rent/landlords is an active political issue, far from consensus, so it's not just a nitpick to jump in on the implication. Noone is being cancelled

Re: Richard Stallman is coming back to the board of the FSF

#776

Post by visitor1 »

krapp wrote: post #503
SilverRed wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thats a serious misrepresentation of his words. He once had a page on his site saying that he did not think it was harmful if voluntary (eg, consent between people of similar ages but one being over age) He has since removed the post and stated that its more complex than he initially thought.

No. He made multiple statements on his website supporting sexual relationships between adults and minors. There was not simply the one statement he made, then retracted. Here is a comment I made two years ago pointing them all out as well as the context by which any reasonable person would consider them to be in support of pedophilia. And while it is true that he made a single comment after the controversy retracting…

No, you are using exaggerations to try to justify an invalid point. Stallman is a scientist, has an inquisitive mind, will question the world, the laws, the establishment, has traveled the world. Petty minds have never understood the language of great minds.

Re: Richard Stallman is coming back to the board of the FSF

#777

Post by adwn »

tw04 wrote: post #728
adwn wrote: post #626

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You entirely missed the point. A 60 year old man sleeping with someone young enough to be his granddaughter is disgusting. Full stop. You're moving the goal post. At first your claim was that Minsky should have known the women were coerced because otherwise they wouldn't have had sex with him. Now that I've refuted your claim, you shifted your position to, paraphrased, "he's a criminal because what he did offends m…

>You're moving the goal post. At first your claim was that Minsky should have known the women were coerced because otherwise they wouldn't have had sex with him. Now that I've refuted your claim, you shifted your position to, paraphrased, "he's a criminal because what he did offends my moral compass". I didn't shift my claim in the least, you attempted to imply that prostitution is legal. I pointed out that regardles…

> You're batting 0 trying to defend sexual predators here.

This is what's wrong with public discourse in the current cancel culture climate: One cannot even discuss facts without being accused of defending the worst kinds of criminals. Way to go! What's next, are you going to accuse me of being a potential sexual predator if I don't shut up?

Re: Richard Stallman is coming back to the board of the FSF

#778

Post by visitor1 »

spurgu wrote: post #256
stephenr wrote: post #233

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, he did, multiple times. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20994216

I find it refreshing to see someone willing to talk and think about these taboo kind of subjects. Myself I think it (sexual interaction) boils down to mutual consent, but there's obviously an age where a person cannot grasp the scope of what they're consenting to. And necrophilia fails this definition since consent is impossible (unless written in a will). And now having looked into what he was actually accused of, o…

"Sexual assault" is an abused term, it does not make justice to real victims or real assault. Here's Nadine Strossen (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nadine_Strossen) on the subject:

"So we see the term sexual assault and sexual harrassment used for example, when a guy asks a woman out on a date and she doesn’t find that an appealing invitation. Maybe he used poor judgement in asking her out, maybe he didn’t, but in any case that is NOT sexual assault or harassment. To call it that is to really demean the huge horror and violence and predation that does exist when you are talking about violent sexual assault. People use the term sexual assault / sexual harassment to refer to any comment about gender or sexuality issues that they disagree with or a joke that might not be in the best taste, again is that to be commended? No! But to condemn it and equate it with a violent sexual assault again is really denying and demeaning the actual suffering that people who are victims of sexual assault endure. It trivializes the serious infractions that are committed by people like Jeffrey Epstein and Harvey Weinstein. So that is one point that he [Stallman] made that I think is very important that I strongly agree with." https://www.wetheweb.org/post/cancel-we-the-web

Re: Richard Stallman is coming back to the board of the FSF

#779

Post by DreamScatter »

kelnos wrote: post #389
bsder wrote: post #270

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Okay. I think your statements indicate you are a jerk. Do I now suddenly get to punish you? Do I get to go to your boss and try to get him to fire you? See the problem?

I mean... yes? That's exactly what you do? The boss is presumably a rational human being and can decide if your complaints have merit or not. If you personally are in a position to punish someone who you believe is a jerk, then yeah, you'll probably punish them, because that's just how social interaction works.

Ah ok, sounds like you are a jerk yourself then, lets get you fired, since you think that's what social interaction is.

Re: Richard Stallman is coming back to the board of the FSF

#780

Post by angry_octet »

angry_octet wrote: post #714
temp8964 wrote: post #697

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We should have moral giants lead every institution. Saints! The Perfect Beings! Please come down Earth to save this planet!

There are many exemplary and inspiring individuals in the open source community. Doubling down on a shitty one doesn't make any sense. But FSF is willing to sabotage its own reason for existence to satisfy his ego.

Your downvotes are just proving my point. You reveal yourselves to be unapologetic misogynists and protectors of institutional sexual predators.
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