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EPFL cancels Stallman's lecture citing “the situation regarding” his persona

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Re: EPFL cancels Stallman's lecture citing “the situation regarding” his persona

#341

Post by tedivm »

Manuel_D wrote: post #193
tedivm wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

She was 17, and it happened in Florida where the age of consent was 18 at the time. So it really doesn't matter how "willingly" she may have presented herself. Also, come on, I'm 37 and I wouldn't have sex with a teenager. Even beyond legality (which isn't really an issue, the dude is dead) there are the ethical considerations. This dude was sketchy and RMS is sketchy for defending him.

> She was 17, and it happened in Florida where the age of consent was 18 at the time. So it really doesn't matter how "willingly" she may have presented herself. Stallman's whole point is that Epstein almost certainly concealed these facts from his associates. Stallman does not in any way argue that these women's and girls aren't victims, only that Minsky was likely unaware of this. I don't see anything sketchy about…

Ignorance isn't considered a defense for statutory rape.

Re: EPFL cancels Stallman's lecture citing “the situation regarding” his persona

#342

Post by sph »

anonymouskimmer wrote: post #338
prepend wrote: post #333

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I get it’s icky for you, but I think the world is trying to move into a “don’t kink shame consenting adults” phase where there’s less commenting in the vein of “sure sodomy is legal, but personally, I find it icky.” I’m not sure many people in the world are interested in what you and I find icky. If the 30 year is mentally incompetent and unaware of their future as a caretaker then the issue isn’t age, but abuse of t…

There are kinks which deserved to be shamed, and these are the kinks in which grooming and ratcheted boundary violations exist. This includes relationships which weren't always seen as kinks, but have become so as society has evolved. Age is a parameter which can sometimes be shamed because of possible differentials in experience. It can't be shamed all of the time, but there are valid reasons to use it as a first-li…

> There are kinks which deserved to be shamed, and these are the kinks in which grooming and ratcheted boundary violations exist.

Oh yeah, and who decides? Stop acting as if there is an absolute universal moral. There's none. Everything apart "don't hurt people and living beings" are arbitrary rules we have agreed upon over time. And in any case, even that is just as arbitrary, but pretty much everyone is in favour of.

Sodomy between consenting adults doesn't hurt anyone, nor a weirdly horny 16 yo going at it with an older adult because they wanted to. Prepubescent paedophilia on the other hand is entirely traumatic because one is simply not sexually tuned at that age, so they cannot consent.

I don't know why people make a mountain out of a molehill. Are all involved parties consenting? Are they of sound mind and body? Then do whatever the hell you want.

> Every kink deserves nested evaluation as to whether it should be totally shamed

Fuck no, keep your morality ideas for yourself. Who are you to judge?

Re: EPFL cancels Stallman's lecture citing “the situation regarding” his persona

#343

Post by arp242 »

rayiner wrote: post #319
friend_and_foe wrote: post #317

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm with you til the last paragraph. Why does the age of consent just keep going up? How long before we have laws regulating age gaps for full grown adults? At what age does a person get entrusted by the All Knowing Democratic State to make all their own personal decisions for themselves? Maybe the real explanation is that the age is arbitrary, a 17 year old is most likely as capable as an 18 year old of making these…

> Why does the age of consent just keep going up? Human brains aren’t fully developed until the mid-20s. Historically, people got married and had sex long before that, but those relationships were arranged by family that at least in theory was supposed to make good decisions for the young person. As society has moved to an individualistic model, where adults are taken out of the loop, it makes sense that the age of c…

By this reasoning a 21-year old also cannot consent to sex with another 21-year old, or indeed, can consent to anything else. You're correct that human brains aren't fully developed until the age of 25 or so, but that doesn't mean humans are blubbering morons who can't consent to anything before that age.

Also it's not at all established that anything actually happened with Minsky; from the testimony it's only clear that she "was directed" to have sex with Minsky, but not that any sexual activity took place. Given that she was clear about this in other cases, it seems that nothing happened.

Re: EPFL cancels Stallman's lecture citing “the situation regarding” his persona

#344

Post by michael1999 »

marcodiego wrote: post #32

Bill Gates had bonds with Epstein. His multi decade marriage fell after the fact became public. He didn't get 1% the flak that Stallman had for commenting about a word to describe Marvin Minsky.

Bill Gates is a billionaire, guarded by assistants, PR consultants, and crisis management consultants. RMS is an awkward nerd, one step up from couch surfing. Easy targets are easy targets.

Re: EPFL cancels Stallman's lecture citing “the situation regarding” his persona

#345

Post by kevviiinn »

lockhouse wrote: post #296
thraway3837 wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Like I said, there's no reason to debate certain things anymore. You mentioned the exact point that I preemptively stated. We don't debate that racism is bad, there's no debate to be had about it. We don't debate climate change, it's a fact. We don't debate women's rights, its been decided a thousand times over and the effects have been proven several million times over. Asking to debate these things is unproductive…

> Like I said, there's no reason to debate certain things anymore. That's your opinion. > We don't debate that racism is bad The Supreme Court is about to decide on a case regarding Affirmative Action, which is the practice of making decisions based upon someone's race (AKA racism). https://www.forbes.com/sites/shaunharper/2023/05/04/presiden... > We decided as a collective that murder, rape, abortion, climate change…

>Same with climate change, not even the entire scientific community is certain to the degree of man-made influence on our climate.

This is false, the scientific community that studies climate is in agreement of the impact of humans. It's absurd to call the three scientists that fox news has on to deny climate change anything more than less than 1% of scientists involved in the matter. 99%+ of climate scientists along with the current state of research definitely agrees that humans have had an incredible impact on the current changes we see in the climate

It's like that stat that says 9/10 dentists agree that brushing your teeth is good or whatever. Are you going to side with the one dentist that doesn't? That's what you're doing here

Re: EPFL cancels Stallman's lecture citing “the situation regarding” his persona

#346

Post by prepend »

anonymouskimmer wrote: post #338
prepend wrote: post #333

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I get it’s icky for you, but I think the world is trying to move into a “don’t kink shame consenting adults” phase where there’s less commenting in the vein of “sure sodomy is legal, but personally, I find it icky.” I’m not sure many people in the world are interested in what you and I find icky. If the 30 year is mentally incompetent and unaware of their future as a caretaker then the issue isn’t age, but abuse of t…

There are kinks which deserved to be shamed, and these are the kinks in which grooming and ratcheted boundary violations exist. This includes relationships which weren't always seen as kinks, but have become so as society has evolved. Age is a parameter which can sometimes be shamed because of possible differentials in experience. It can't be shamed all of the time, but there are valid reasons to use it as a first-li…

All right church lady. I’m not sure how you choose which kinks are shameworthy. I’ll stick to what’s illegal, thanks- pedo, necro, beast, etc. And then a simple heuristic like if it’s consenting adults and legal then that’s enough for me.

Re: EPFL cancels Stallman's lecture citing “the situation regarding” his persona

#347

Post by prepend »

sph wrote: post #342
anonymouskimmer wrote: post #338

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are kinks which deserved to be shamed, and these are the kinks in which grooming and ratcheted boundary violations exist. This includes relationships which weren't always seen as kinks, but have become so as society has evolved. Age is a parameter which can sometimes be shamed because of possible differentials in experience. It can't be shamed all of the time, but there are valid reasons to use it as a first-li…

> There are kinks which deserved to be shamed, and these are the kinks in which grooming and ratcheted boundary violations exist. Oh yeah, and who decides? Stop acting as if there is an absolute universal moral. There's none. Everything apart "don't hurt people and living beings" are arbitrary rules we have agreed upon over time. And in any case, even that is just as arbitrary, but pretty much everyone is in favour o…

> Oh yeah, and who decides?

I think there’s a game theory where whatever people think others think is bad are shameworthy.

It doesn’t seem principle based and instead works backwards from disliking someone and the working backwards to find something wrong. That seems like a bad way to set moral standards and social norms. And sets us up for a constant second guessing of what to do or say, etc etc.

I think having a clear rule set (is legal? Is consenting? Then none of my business) is more productive. The last thing I want is people believing they need to perform some “nested evaluation” to determine if my missionary sex kink is appropriate or not.

An example that I encountered recently is that a friend was asking me to comment on other friends’ open marriage and tried a “would I permit that” reasoning to determine if it was appropriate. Asking simple questions like “is it legal” and “are all parties willing” is possible. But trying to have every person apply their own preference onto other people is a nightmare.

Re: EPFL cancels Stallman's lecture citing “the situation regarding” his persona

#348

Post by usernew »

rayiner wrote: post #323
sph wrote: post #257

Earlier quoted context omitted.

American culture, including Puritanism, being exported worldwide since the 1980s, first through Hollywood and then through tech. You will not find a less Puritanical view of the matter on a forum composed of mostly people from the US or deeply embedded within its culture, like many software engineers are. For US and tech, sex talk and sexual freedom is a concept best avoided. You'll find more people arguing against g…

Americans are sexual deviants by the standards of Asia (where I’m from), the Middle East, and Africa.

[dead]

Re: EPFL cancels Stallman's lecture citing “the situation regarding” his persona

#349

Post by rayiner »

friend_and_foe wrote: post #328
rayiner wrote: post #319

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Why does the age of consent just keep going up? Human brains aren’t fully developed until the mid-20s. Historically, people got married and had sex long before that, but those relationships were arranged by family that at least in theory was supposed to make good decisions for the young person. As society has moved to an individualistic model, where adults are taken out of the loop, it makes sense that the age of c…

No, "trafficking" is a legal term that means people were unlawfully coerced into work. I don't just disagree with the view, it is on its face disingenuous.

https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/sex_trafficking

“Section 1591 covers sex trafficking for both children and adults. This provision, however, applies to trafficking in adults aged 18 or older for commercial sex acts only if done by actual or threatened force, fraud, or coercion. The use of force, fraud, or coercion is not necessary for criminal liability to attach when the victim is under 18 years of age.”

“Coercion” is defined to mean threats of physical harm or physical restraint, or threats of abuse of legal process.

Epstein was charged with sex trafficking of minors, so the government didn’t need to prove the “force, fraud, or coercion” element. For her part, Giuffre’s primary allegation is that she was “groomed” while she was underage.

Re: EPFL cancels Stallman's lecture citing “the situation regarding” his persona

#350

Post by [deleted] »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #194
asdfman123 wrote: post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You’re right, that is a misquote. But what he actually wrote honestly wasn’t that much better. The problem with a lot of these sorts things is intentionally making yourself blind to the emotional impact, pretending not to know, when some part of you does understand what you’re doing. It’s all just plausible deniability. We get it quite clearly, we don’t need it explained to us. You might say this is tone policing but…

> You’re right, that is a misquote. But what he actually wrote honestly wasn’t that much better Agree. Broadly speaking, if someone is accused of a moral crime about which you have no privileged information, publicly hypothesizing about how they might be innocent is tantamount to a defence. It's a limit on free speech. And in private circles, it could be debated responsibly. But when stated publicly, the argument's c…

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