Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

In Defense of Richard Stallman

geoff.greer.fm

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

111–120 of 681 posts

Re: In Defense of Richard Stallman

#111

Post by antientropic »

CPLX wrote: post #47

Our culture has made a very bright line decision that sex with minors is unacceptable. Expressing doubt about this cultural norm, or especially advocating against it, is considered unacceptable. Of course one can argue with the merits of those two facts, but they are plainly true and fairly widely accepted. The very concept of statutory rape reinforces how clear this judgment is. The reference to "statutory" means th…

If this social norm is so "phenomenally clear", then why are there such wildly different ages of consent even among western countries and US states? It seems strange that the ability to consent magically appears the day you turn (say) 18. I mean, the law has to draw a line somewhere, but intellectuals like RMS should be allowed to talk about such things without being cast out of civilized society.

Re: In Defense of Richard Stallman

#112

Post by t0astbread »

I wouldn't call the MIT CSAIL list "private communications". Sure, it's not open to the general public but it is public enough to warrant a public discussion. (Additionally it has members around the same age as the abuse victim.)

Re: In Defense of Richard Stallman

#113

Post by rvz »

coldtea wrote: post #76

Diversity -- but no diversity of opinion... Inclusiveness -- but let's ostracize the non-conforming aspie... Fairness -- but let's fire people or make them resign from unrelated positions for their personal opinions, because obviously all of a person's life should serve as a big PR, and god forbid they don't play the role 24/7. Someone might call them for it on Twitter, and what could their employee/organization do o…

Spot on.

You have just outlined the double-speak of the SV technocracy, which have imposed these hidden codes on those that they disagree with. Mind you that the media has now amplified this and have used all of this to create a new enemy called Richard Stallman. As long as this appalling cancel-culture behaviour stops, he certainly won't be the last one to fall victim to these purity tests.

Absolutely hypocritical indeed.

Re: In Defense of Richard Stallman

#114

Post by throw0101a »

sergiosgc wrote: post #36
Barrin92 wrote: post #10

> They focused on his tone deaf communication style and awkward demeanor. They spoke of behavior from decades ago and pointed out the fact that he had a mattress in his office. It wasn't just awkward demeanor. He actively made women feel unwelcome in the workplace and behaved unprofessionally over and over again. > He held his positions at MIT, GNU, and the FSF for over thirty years, and in that time nobody accused h…

> It wasn't just awkward demeanor. He actively made women feel unwelcome in the workplace and behaved unprofessionally over and over again. Every episode I read about fell into the category of "socially awkward adult male". If we can't, as a group, tolerate awkwardness, we are very much down the rabbit hole of mandatory social conformity. By all means, point me to a real abuse scenario by Stallman. I like being prove…

> Every episode I read about fell into the category of "socially awkward adult male". If we can't, as a group, tolerate awkwardness, we are very much down the rabbit hole of mandatory social conformity.

Perhaps you need to read about more episodes:

> I worked 10 years ago at VA Linux which had Richard Stallman on its board of directors. You might have heard that Stallman applied his open source ideas to his publicly open marriage as well. The problem was that he was more than open. He made overt sexual advances to women at work. One young woman who worked next to me was so upset from his multiple advances that she took it to senior management. She was able to deal with the problem without taking the issue outside the company. I don’t know the details, but she was given advanced warning anytime Stallman was headed over so that she could leave. He was a creep and women at the company knew to stay away.

* https://daringfireball.net/2019/09/richard_stallmans_disgrac...

Re: In Defense of Richard Stallman

#115

Post by glandium »

Do we need another rehash? The only thing new I learned here is that his log showed a resignation from the GNU project leadership (https://archive.is/wHrTo), which has since been removed, and that came only two days after saying he wouldn't, joking about being a nuisance at the same time (https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/info-gnu/2019-09/msg00008...)

Edit: as for the "maybe homeless" claim, as far as I know, it's his life style. Relatedly, I've heard many horror stories of people who hosted him. Here's one I saw recently (with more in the replies): https://mobile.twitter.com/migueldeicaza/status/117398128703...

Re: In Defense of Richard Stallman

#117

Post by dpq »

NeedMoreTea wrote: post #69
sergiosgc wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It wasn't just awkward demeanor. He actively made women feel unwelcome in the workplace and behaved unprofessionally over and over again. Every episode I read about fell into the category of "socially awkward adult male". If we can't, as a group, tolerate awkwardness, we are very much down the rabbit hole of mandatory social conformity. By all means, point me to a real abuse scenario by Stallman. I like being prove…

Ignoring a legal age of consent, refusing to accept the accepted definitions of assault and rape, and claiming they were actually willing are emphatically not just "socially awkward".

> claiming they were actually willing

Did you even bother to read the emails or at the very least the article? This misconception is exactly what's being argued there, that Stallman said something clearly different.

> Ignoring a legal age of consent

By doing what, raping someone underage? Or rather expressing his opinion that it's ridiculous that when in one state the age of consent is 16, in another one it's 18, and yet people are judged morally and criminally for failing to distinguish between these two? So basically what you're saying is that possessing a non-standard opinion and criticizing existing laws should make you a non-person. I believe you'd feel very much at home in the USSR, the communist party had the same ideas.

Re: In Defense of Richard Stallman

#118

Post by ourlordcaffeine »

mbel wrote: post #89
sergiosgc wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It wasn't just awkward demeanor. He actively made women feel unwelcome in the workplace and behaved unprofessionally over and over again. Every episode I read about fell into the category of "socially awkward adult male". If we can't, as a group, tolerate awkwardness, we are very much down the rabbit hole of mandatory social conformity. By all means, point me to a real abuse scenario by Stallman. I like being prove…

> If we can't, as a group, tolerate awkwardness, we are very much down the rabbit hole of mandatory social conformity. Which seem to go against all goals of diversity and inclusiveness. If we strive for more diverse community we have accept quirks of some people. Only in purely homogeneous group everybody can be comfortable and not offended.

Society: "We must embrace neuro-diversiry"

Midly Autistic, not-good-looking man: Shows signs of autism

Society: "No! Not like that! Kill it! Kill it!"

Re: In Defense of Richard Stallman

#120

Post by urbanjunkie »

coldtea wrote: post #76

Diversity -- but no diversity of opinion... Inclusiveness -- but let's ostracize the non-conforming aspie... Fairness -- but let's fire people or make them resign from unrelated positions for their personal opinions, because obviously all of a person's life should serve as a big PR, and god forbid they don't play the role 24/7. Someone might call them for it on Twitter, and what could their employee/organization do o…

You should be banned from HN for this - you initially stated that you wanted to see the finger pointers "dead and buried" and then edited it.

You are a coward.

Post reply on HN