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RMS addresses the free software community

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Re: RMS addresses the free software community

#81

Post by mariusor »

Reading this breaks my heart a little. Having the humility to bow to the people that harassed him and the FSF is a gesture I wasn't really expecting from him.

However it's refreshing to see that people that are consistently seen as abrasive and negative, can introspect, even due to external circumstances, and try to correct their behaviour so late in life.

I feel like online we need to try to empathize a lot more with others that don't match the well established "disadvantaged" categories instead of piling on the negativity.

Re: RMS addresses the free software community

#83

Post by underseacables »

tablespoon wrote: post #76
underseacables wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, no that’s not how journalism works. They report the FACTS as they see them. /s There’s no such thing as a retraction anymore, it’s just clarifications. I would have more faith in the media if they admitted when they were wrong, or at least presented, thoughtfully considered, opposing viewpoints. My faith in the media perhaps really took its first hit with Nick Sandman. I just felt weird that all these people were…

> There’s no such thing as a retraction anymore, it’s just clarifications. I think journalism always mostly did "corrections." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Correction_(newspaper)

Ah thank you, quite interesting. Allow me to clarify: when I was riding those words I had an article on a webpage in my mind. Because articles are so online now, it’s easy to change things and call them clarifications, and people miss the slight of hand that it might have been actually a retraction of statements.

I do recall clarifications and amplifications in physical newspapers, always intriguing.

Re: RMS addresses the free software community

#84

Post by imwillofficial »

DiggyJohnson wrote: post #80
Osmose wrote: post #49

The Minsky defense was not the primary, most important reason RMS can't serve as an effective, inclusive leader for free software, it was just the one that got the most attention. This does nothing to address the numerous complaints of harassment towards MIT students, the _other_ times he spoke out in implicit support of pedophilia, the public gaffes that are unacceptable as a public representative (e.g. the foot ski…

Sure, but does any of that keep you from empathizing with the content of this letter?

Yes

Re: RMS addresses the free software community

#85

Post by thewakalix »

sneak wrote: post #75
pydry wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are there sources for rms's long history of sexual harassment?

Mostly in-person around MIT (just like Captain Crunch or Jake Appelbaum in the conference scene... informal until it wasn't), but a few have made it onto the web. See #2 here: https://selamjie.medium.com/remove-richard-stallman-appendix...

1. rumors

2. a mattress with “obvious implications” which I doubt he found obvious

3. rms: “I’m suicidal, please date me”

Regardless of whether or not this qualifies as “harassment” (semantic arguments being pointless), I don’t think this justifies Removing him in any sense.

Re: RMS addresses the free software community

#86

Post by Ygg2 »

sneak wrote: post #75
pydry wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are there sources for rms's long history of sexual harassment?

Mostly in-person around MIT (just like Captain Crunch or Jake Appelbaum in the conference scene... informal until it wasn't), but a few have made it onto the web. See #2 here: https://selamjie.medium.com/remove-richard-stallman-appendix...

Those read as, "he made me uncomfortable". That's not sexual harassment.

Re: RMS addresses the free software community

#87

Post by Sharlin »

whatshisface wrote: post #35
heinrichhartman wrote: post #15

I think message is genuine, and sympathize with his stand. His work on free software has been invaluable and shaped the software world in a good way. To paint the whole person as a "bad guy" ("terrible person") in the context of the latest developments always seemed off to me. However, usually apologies in this context backfire. Everything that you say about this can and will be used against you. This has happened to…

> However, usually apologies in this context backfire. As pointed out by other commenters, this is more of a defense, or an explanation, than it is an apology.

So technically it is an apology but in the other sense of the word :)

Re: RMS addresses the free software community

#88

Post by imwillofficial »

Zelphyr wrote: post #60
loloquwowndueo wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which apology? He’s only apologizing once quickly for losing his temper (Sometimes I lost my temper because I didn't have the social skills to avoid it. Some people could cope with this; others were hurt. I apologize to each of them.) and spends a whole lot of time explaining why he is different and we should all put up with his social ineptitude because he didn’t know better. That does not constitute an apology. We…

Genuine question: if he had actually used the words "I'm sorry" or "I apologize", would that have made you feel better about what he said?

Yes

Re: RMS addresses the free software community

#89

Post by geofft »

b215826 wrote: post #10

Now, would the journalists who wrote articles with titles that are a variation of "RMS defended Epstein" [1,2] apologize or at least correct their articles? Also, now that RMS has explicitly clarified his position on these issues, can the people who leveraged his "silence" and "bad behavior" to oust him from the FSF at least admit that their motive was less about making the free-software movement welcoming and was mo…

RMS disaffiliated from MIT in the '80s (see "Commencing the project" in https://www.gnu.org/gnu/thegnuproject.en.html), so I'm not sure that any headline saying "Famed MIT Computer Scientist..." to refer to him was interested in accuracy in the first place.

Re: RMS addresses the free software community

#90

Post by skjfdoslifjeifj »

sneak wrote: post #75
pydry wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are there sources for rms's long history of sexual harassment?

Mostly in-person around MIT (just like Captain Crunch or Jake Appelbaum in the conference scene... informal until it wasn't), but a few have made it onto the web. See #2 here: https://selamjie.medium.com/remove-richard-stallman-appendix...

I'm not seeing much from women that actually went to MIT and interacted with him there. A lot of the accusations I've seen are second hand stories/rumours from third parties that never went to MIT or interacted with him directly.
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