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Mozilla, Tor Join Calls to Oust Richard Stallman from Free Software Foundation

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Re: Mozilla, Tor Join Calls to Oust Richard Stallman from Free Software Foundation

#171

Post by anthk »

kristopolous wrote: post #170
anthk wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That in Europe it's just "Monday". In my country, the legal age to consent is 16. And, a few years ago, it was... 13!!!

I would agree somewhere there is a threshold where abuse can reasonably be assumed. But abuse has to be the thing demonstrated for the crime and not merely the age of the participants. I agree those implications sound shocking, but please read on: When it comes to criminality, we need to stay focused on the abuse and manipulation and not be distracted by ages or any other correlative relationship. Going over the line…

OFC, bear in mind having consent low in Spain said a lot of other terms, such as if you were 14 and commited some serious crime, (murder for example), you could be jailed as an adult. That got changed a few decades ago with the "Minor's Law" and not everyone was happy because a gang composed of minors commited one of the worst crimes ever in Spain against slightly mentally challenged woman.

On the main theme, yes, the US is paranoid, and a lot of people exploiting the average fear from the American: the market and the consumering society.

Re: Mozilla, Tor Join Calls to Oust Richard Stallman from Free Software Foundation

#172

Post by no-s »

mark_l_watson wrote: post #56
tubbyjr wrote: post #41

Well, there go my annual Tor donations, oh well. Let's see if they can make up for these losses by going the cancel culture/censorship route. And Mozilla has been a joke for a while with their latest CEO. He's literally trying to jump on anything currently trendy, to hold onto his seat and salary for as long as possible while he drives its projects into the bedrock.

I just did the same - no contributions to Tor from me. As I mentioned in a different comment, I also just uninstalled Firefox. Slightly off topic, I have been hammering my friends when they start spouting off cancel culture. I am considerably to the left of most of my friends who are democrats so I don't think it is political. Too many people judge written or spoken words based on who said them, rather than the conte…

>I also just uninstalled Firefox.

I already ditched Mozilla over the Brendan Eich smear. I'm through with Maoist-inspired tech. The idea that people must atone and genuflect for having a contrary opinion is purely reprehensible.

Re: Mozilla, Tor Join Calls to Oust Richard Stallman from Free Software Foundation

#173

Post by natmaka »

threatofrain wrote: post #149
salawat wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, you don't, you need a modest dose of pattern recognition ability to recognize the fundamental pattern behind cancel culture. It's the same thing, different day, and always worth standing in opposition of no matter where you are on the political spectrum, or where the victim stands in relation to you.

I see cancel culture as used by the political party who likely does not recognize banning abortion clinics by law through an entire state as cancellation. The stakes aren’t a matter of Twitter hates you. Your boss firing you doesn’t mean your doctor is banned from giving you an abortion. Or when TX sought to enforce a ban on gay sex in 2003, I really doubt the GOP sees that as cancellation. It’s a kind of failure to…

The very fact that the GOP is also guilty of the cancellations you exposed doesn't preclude anyone, including the GOP, to complain about other forms of cancellation. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tu_quoque

Re: Mozilla, Tor Join Calls to Oust Richard Stallman from Free Software Foundation

#174

Post by [deleted] »

gentleman11 wrote: post #74
kbelder wrote: post #16

I want to like Firefox. It is at least a tolerable alternative to Chrome. But the Mozilla foundation just taints it. Every time they come out with one of their sanctimonious PR releases they make me want to have less to do with them. I think they've completely lost their focus. I end up bouncing between Chrome, Firefox, and Brave. Brave makes me the happiest, but it's a minor player, and I'm worried about it's long-t…

Brave only exists because Mozilla fired eich for some donations he made to an anti gay-marriage group, iirc. I really dislike the donation he made, but firing people for their legal personal political behaviour is like poison to a free society

[deleted]

Re: Mozilla, Tor Join Calls to Oust Richard Stallman from Free Software Foundation

#175

Post by pseudalopex »

gentleman11 wrote: post #74
kbelder wrote: post #16

I want to like Firefox. It is at least a tolerable alternative to Chrome. But the Mozilla foundation just taints it. Every time they come out with one of their sanctimonious PR releases they make me want to have less to do with them. I think they've completely lost their focus. I end up bouncing between Chrome, Firefox, and Brave. Brave makes me the happiest, but it's a minor player, and I'm worried about it's long-t…

Brave only exists because Mozilla fired eich for some donations he made to an anti gay-marriage group, iirc. I really dislike the donation he made, but firing people for their legal personal political behaviour is like poison to a free society

Eich wasn't fired. He resigned because people didn't want to follow him.

Re: Mozilla, Tor Join Calls to Oust Richard Stallman from Free Software Foundation

#176

Post by Aldo_MX »

I'll be honest here, I dislike the cancel culture with passion.

When an angry mob tries to cancel a person there are 3 things that bothers me:

1. The cancellers are judging the past actions of a person with today's values, and are judging the past version of the person as if such person hadn't had already the chance to reflect on their past actions, accept their mistakes and become a better person.

2. The cancellers are becoming paradoxically the epitome of the paradox of tolerance by destroying the ability of others to be tolerant: Agree with us or we'll cancel you.

3. The cancellers are hidden behind the anonymity that their numbers provide, so they can destroy other people's lives with impunity. Cancellers should be held accountable for their actions.

Re: Mozilla, Tor Join Calls to Oust Richard Stallman from Free Software Foundation

#177

Post by pseudalopex »

lamp987 wrote: post #150
orra wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A plethora of women have come forward, with their stories of sexual harassment and manipulation by RMS. (See links in other posts; e.g. the first link in the open letter's appendix.) This isn't just about him describing a "sex trafficking victim" as "entirely willing", and hence not a victim of "sexual assault". This is wrong on so many levels.

I'd prefer if there was plethora of evidence.

Testimony is evidence.

Re: Mozilla, Tor Join Calls to Oust Richard Stallman from Free Software Foundation

#178

Post by pseudalopex »

jrm4 wrote: post #39

I'm trying to weigh this very carefully and it's hard to get a complete picture (which is part of the problem,) but I think the thing that rubs me most the wrong way is the general flimsiness of the arguments against RMS. It's very clear that he has words and actions in the past that must be addressed and atoned for (and perhaps has) -- but it is not at all clear to me that these words and ideas justify removing the…

He resigned in 2019. There was lots of discussion at the time. Not so much before he returned.

Re: Mozilla, Tor Join Calls to Oust Richard Stallman from Free Software Foundation

#179

Post by geofft »

MauranKilom wrote: post #139
geofft wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perhaps a better way of putting this is that while autism doesn't need a "cure," being an asshole is absolutely a thing that - if it is indeed caused by a medical condition - a medical professional can help with. (And if it is not caused by a medical condition, then it is simply a character flaw, and should be judged like a willful character flaw and not like a medical condition.) There are plenty of autistic people…

> figure out when he's alienating people and figure out how to stop I read through the appendix in the open letter and find no discussion of this. If he did stop, would you agree that this entire letter was baseless?

I personally find the open letter a bit short on these sorts of details. I think better sources are these:

http://ebb.org/bkuhn/blog/2019/10/15/fsf-rms.html (October 2019, by a former FSF board member and 2021 recipient of the FSF's Award for the Advancement of Free Software):

> For the last two years, I had been a loud internal voice in the FSF leadership regarding RMS' Free-Software-unrelated public statements; I felt strongly that it was in the best interest of the FSF to actively seek to limit such statements, and that it was my duty to FSF to speak out about this within the organization. [...] When the escalation started, I still considered RMS both a friend and colleague, and I attempted to argue with him at length to convince him that some of his positions were harmful to sexual assault survivors and those who are sex-trafficked, and to the people who devote their lives in service to such individuals. More importantly to the FSF, I attempted to persuade RMS that launching a controversial campaign on sexual behavior and morality was counter to his and FSF's mission to advance software freedom, and told RMS that my duty as an FSF Director was to assure the best outcome for the FSF, which IMO didn't include having a leader who made such statements.

https://mjg59.dreamwidth.org/52587.html (September 2019, by a former FSF board member and 2014 recipient of the FSF's Award for the Advancement of Free Software):

> I've spent a lot of time working with him to help him understand why various positions he holds are harmful. I've reached the conclusion that it's not that he's unable to understand, he's just unwilling to change his mind.

They aren't going to change the letter or its appendix at this point, given that people have signed, but if I had the magic power to change it, I would suggest those two as citations that he was repeatedly asked to consider the impact of his actions and repeatedly refused.

If he did stop - if he did express the interest in figuring out why he's alienating people and why his statements were not only hurting the cause of free software directly but wasting the time of FSF board members who could be contributing to free software instead - then yes, the letter would have been unnecessary, because the problem would have been resolved.

Re: Mozilla, Tor Join Calls to Oust Richard Stallman from Free Software Foundation

#180

Post by tssva »

yellowapple wrote: post #135
dragonwriter wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> As a very liberal person, I have to say that I am disgusted by cancel culture. Are you using the non-American and leftist American definition of “liberal” (center-to-center-right capitalist) or the American center-right-to-right definition of “liberal” (anything left of the center-right) when you say “very liberal”? > when I read Stallman's actual comments last year, I thought that it was very clear that he was onl…

> Are you using the non-American and leftist American definition of “liberal” (center-to-center-right capitalist) or the American center-right-to-right definition of “liberal” (anything left of the center-right) when you say “very liberal”? Not sure if it matters, since in both cases it's applicable: 1. From a true liberal (moderate capitalist) standpoint, RMS has every right to his views, and the FSF has every right…

@Mozilla is the twitter account of the non-profit Mozilla Foundation and not the for profit Mozilla Corporation.
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