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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

#221

Post by ip34162 »

mark_l_watson wrote: post #30

As a very liberal person, I have to say that I am disgusted by cancel culture. Disgusted. This is so harmful to society, and is a dark path that the left has taken in my country. To put it plainly, my political party has turned into whinny little people. People should lose their jobs over things like sexual or any type of harassment but when I read Stallman's actual comments last year, I thought that it was very clea…

// People should lose their jobs over things like sexual or any type of harassment //

It's not just the Minsky issue that makes people don't want RMS to be in power. It's also a pattern of sexual harassment towards women, since long back, in conferences and MIT. They can be found online, idk whether there is an article that details everything. I think most just want him not to be in a position of power. Just copying another comment from a flagged HN post below:

Here's some readings on why many don't want RMS in a leadership position.

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21287006

[2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20994216

[3] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26545420

[4] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26535789

[5] https://guix.gnu.org/blog/2019/joint-statement-on-the-gnu-pr...

. .

Some well-regarded papers on sexism in CS, which are still relevant.

[1] Why are There so Few Female Computer Scientists (Ellen Spertus, 1991)

https://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/7040

[2] How to Encourage Women in Linux (Val Henson, 2002)

https://tldp.org/HOWTO/Encourage-Women-Linux-HOWTO/

[3] What Happens to Us Does Not Happen to Most of You (Kathryn S. McKinley, 2018)

https://www.sigarch.org/what-happens-to-us-does-not-happen-t...

[4] Unlocking the Clubhouse: Women in Computing (Jane Margolis and Allan Fisher, 2001)

https://www.amazon.com/Unlocking-Clubhouse-Women-Computing-P...

[5] The Elephant in the Valley (by Michele Madansky and Trae Vassallo, 2015)

https://www.elephantinthevalley.com/

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

#222

Post by shock »

gitrog wrote: post #216
claudiawerner wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

'Cancel culture' is a thing - it's been the subject of academic scrutiny, even by left-leaning professors and academics on how it affects movements within the left. And you're right, it isn't a uniquely 'leftist' thing. But purity politics (whether the predecessor or the underlying philosophy of how 'cancel culture' operates - regardless of whether it's a 'thing' or not) and moral grandstanding are serious topics of…

I would love to read the academic material on "Cancel culture" being an objective thing. Would you point me to that?

I found no instance of the word "objective" in the GP's comment, so no pointing necessary.

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

#223

Post by natmaka »

threatofrain wrote: post #219
natmaka wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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

According to the GOP, these aren't cancellations, but matters of spiritual and moral clarity. Before one rushes to the aid of those who are powerful, one might first observe those who live underfoot. It is reasonable to say that in the lifetime of your children, it will still be a Constitutional right for Christian businesses and employees to deny gay employees or customers.

Isn't, according to cancelers, cancellation about moral clarity or in other terms "politically correct" stuff?

By definition those who are powerful don't need my aid, and I'm only here to learn.

Denying an employee (and even a customer, if one really wants so) for any real reason is already possible and done, by invoking any other reason. Such a Constitutional Right doesn't change anything.

Trying to coerce people into interacting with persons they don't like is either moot or, if apparently efficient for a while because "those who are powerful" enforce it, leads to a major clash as soon as this power vanishes.

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

#224

Post by shock »

orra wrote: post #152
vlsmaker wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For heavens sake, "business or pleasure?" was the question you were asked at the border before getting a stamp in your passport once upon a time. So a business card turned into a pleasure card , which has nothing to do with sex at all, except for people who want to see things that aren't there. It's one of RMS's quaint re-namings, and people turn it into something sinister. > Women at MIT were warned away from him, t…

You downplay the sexual harassment of handing out these 'pleasure cards'. But ultimately, real women are upset by it. The unprofessional behavior discourages women from being in tech. Just because you wouldn't mind receiving such a card, doesn't mean it's not harassment. I mean, do you understand (a) the nature of consent, and (b) professional workplace environments?

> But ultimately, real women are upset by it.

I wouldn't call anyone (woman or man) that can't handle being upset "real". In fact it is the opposite of it. It shows a distinct lack of skills in dealing with reality, that is if you accept that real life is not just rainbows and sunshine, no matter how much we desire so.

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

#225

Post by belorn »

orra wrote: post #151
belorn wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you mean to say that a "plethora of women" was exactly one alleged claim by one woman that RMS had said he would kill himself unless she went out with him on a date? If it is true then that was bad, and I am sure that gave him a reputation that on a campus likely burned like a wild fire (it sure would do that on my university if anyone said something like that), but what is an appropriate reaction be now several d…

> The second thing the appendix listed was a mattress in his office whose primary user were most likely RMS himself since he kind of had a reputation of living in the university. Living in an office doesn't excuse having topless people on a mattress in your office.

The claim that his office was some playboy mansion harem goes counter to the extremely desperate concept of using suicide in order to get a date.

The 80's was a different time, but not that different. Unless the "topless people" were RMS himself sleeping on it, I have a hard time believing it. In theory I can imagine (but I doubt it) a warm summer where a team of emacs collaborators were all living and sleeping in the university office room, but I strongly doubt the implication sex went on there.

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

#228

Post by PurpleFoxy »

salawat wrote: post #156
endisneigh wrote: post #51

I don’t have a particular opinion of Stallman since I don’t have all of the facts but I wish Mozilla put more effort in making themselves more sustainable. From a cursory search it doesn’t appear that Stallman has every physically or sexually harassed anyone. Perhaps he has said questionable things but nothing substantial turned up on a search. Hundreds of millions from Google and basically nothing to show for it oth…

Most people point to his essays on GNU.org The best I could determine is that his treatment of chosen pronouns got him labeled transphobic, the abort joke is him being misogynistic (that was him preserving historical/cultural context) in addition to a rather unfortunate lapse of character when coming onto a student once. Most everything I've found tends to map back to stuff dredged up while he was under fire for the…

The irony is stallman posts are possibly the least transphobic things possible. He calls for a new word to be added which is both gender neutral and singular since he doesn’t believe “they” is adequate.

This is what he is being called transphobic over.

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

#229

Post by PurpleFoxy »

gentleman11 wrote: post #57
Acrobatic_Road wrote: post #46

I hope Richard Stallman becomes the director again and fires every SJW at the FSF. If you don't fire these people they will fire you.

Revenge isn’t really his thing

He just wants to carry on the fight against proprietary software.

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

#230

Post by ceceron »

nec4b wrote: post #217
jasonpeacock wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What about all the women who have come forward, talking about what a massive creep he is? This isn't about some technicality about what he said, but a culmination of 30 years of horrible behavior. It takes trivial research (check Twitter) for the many personal accounts from women who will never get close to him, and have been driven from the industry by both him and the people who have protected him.

I recommend that you try with a swimming test first. Strip, bind and throw him in the water and if he stays afloat he is guilty, if he sinks to the bottom, you can still try the fire test next.

We can try to build a wooden bridge made from him. If we succeeded it would be a proof he is a wood, therefore he floats, so basically he is a witch.
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