Richard Stallman resigns from CSAIL at MIT • Hacker News Board

Re: Richard Stallman resigns from CSAIL at MIT

#131

Post by partialrecall » Tue, Sep 17, 2019, 1:54 AM UTC

geofft wrote: post #101

partialrecall wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It really seems like his real 'sin' is not being neurotypical. Should he try to have more tact? Sure, of course. But failing that, the correct response is compassion and gentle correction, not a witchhunt. Not driving him out of his jobs.

Matthew Garrett, who served on the FSF board of directors, wrote about the "not being neurotypical" hypothesis two days ago: https://mjg59.dreamwidth.org/52587.html In particular, he says he did try to do the compassion and gentle correction work, and Stallman had no interest in it. Stallman's job has a job description - leading the Free Software Foundation. If he's not leading it effectively, it is important for his…

I think it should go without saying that atypicality is not a binary matter.

Re: Richard Stallman resigns from CSAIL at MIT

#132

Post by selfawareposter » Tue, Sep 17, 2019, 1:54 AM UTC

melling wrote: post #6

arctux wrote: post #2

Related earlier post: > I want to respond to the misleading media coverage of messages I posted about Marvin Minsky's association with Jeffrey Epstein. The coverage totally mischaracterised my statements. > Headlines say that I defended Epstein. Nothing could be further from the truth. I've called him a "serial rapist", and said he deserved to be imprisoned. But many people now believe I defended him — and other inac…

I didn’t follow the story. Was Stallman taken out of context? Anyway, he probably should have know better than to weigh in. One’s well thought out response and subtle points can often turn out to have a few holes. In fact... “If one would give me six lines written by the hand of the most honest man, I would find something in them to have him hanged”

Yes, but it was also awful in context.

It was taken directly as the girl being “willing” when what he actually said was that she may have been coerced by Epstein into appearing to be “willing” to Minsky.

It doesn’t help that he has a documented history of fucked up comments in this general area.

Re: Richard Stallman resigns from CSAIL at MIT

#133

Post by accntwithnoname » Tue, Sep 17, 2019, 1:54 AM UTC

Good riddance. Aside from his recent comments regarding sexual assault that he claims are missunderstood, MIT alum contributed stories of him being a pervert throughout the years. This type of person does not belong at MIT or in Tech. His contributions to the field do not excuse him. “He literally used to have a mattress on the floor of his office. He kept the door to his office open, to proudly showcase that mattress and all the implications that went with it. Many female students avoided the corridor with his office for that reason…I was one of the course 6 undergrads who avoided that part of NE43 precisely for that reason. (the mattress was also known to have shirtless people lounging on it…)” — Bachelor’s in Computer Science, ‘99 https://medium.com/@selamie/remove-richard-stallman-appendix...

Re: Richard Stallman resigns from CSAIL at MIT

#134

Post by JadeNB » Tue, Sep 17, 2019, 1:54 AM UTC

coolandsmartrr wrote: post #125

geofft wrote: post #56

Worth noting that (as far as I know) Stallman was not a paid employee of MIT, certainly not a professor or anything. He had an office because, I believe, Gerry Sussman (and probably others) thought he should have an office. He's listed as a "visiting scientist" on CSAIL's page: https://www.csail.mit.edu/person/richard-stallman He's around on the mailing list (mostly to reply to every mention of software with a questi…

A little tangential, but I didn't know there was a utility called `finger`. Is this supposed to be a profile directory envisioned for an Internet back when it was more decentralized?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Finger_protocol

Re: Richard Stallman resigns from CSAIL at MIT

#135

Post by selfawareposter » Tue, Sep 17, 2019, 1:55 AM UTC

tzs wrote: post #129

melling wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I didn’t follow the story. Was Stallman taken out of context? Anyway, he probably should have know better than to weigh in. One’s well thought out response and subtle points can often turn out to have a few holes. In fact... “If one would give me six lines written by the hand of the most honest man, I would find something in them to have him hanged”

> I didn’t follow the story. Was Stallman taken out of context? Yes. This statement of Stallman's: > We can imagine many scenarios, but the most plausible scenario is that she presented herself to him as entirely willing. Assuming she was being coerced by Epstein, he would have had every reason to tell her to conceal that from most of his associates. has been reported in several places as Stallman saying Epstein's gi…

Except for the part where he got taken to a remote island by a billionaire and was presented with a very young woman who immediately wanted to have sex with him.

Re: Richard Stallman resigns from CSAIL at MIT

#136

Post by earenndil » Tue, Sep 17, 2019, 1:55 AM UTC

rabite wrote: post #118

Stallman is a genius and lives a life like an ancient Greek philosopher or wandering prophet. Like many brilliant people who occupy that category, he has no sense of social graces. He writes down the things he thinks. He has virtually no theory of mind, no way to perceive how the people around him are going to react to what he says. In the past, that curse has granted us with great gifts as Stallman had the boldness…

The greek philosophers had a very good understanding of social graces. They had a full understanding of the conventions which they were breaking. They chose, out of principle, to break them anyway.

Re: Richard Stallman resigns from CSAIL at MIT

#137

Post by cannonedhamster » Tue, Sep 17, 2019, 1:55 AM UTC

darawk wrote: post #126

geofft wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's weird to me that being considered a "defender of X" could even be a bad thing. That's the process by which we collectively make decisions, it's the basis behind stuff like fair trials for example; the lawyer acting for a defendant is not a bad person. Except that in fair trials we have the concept of stare decisis , that once something has been decided, it's been decided. We very intentionally do not have the…

> The arguments Stallman presented were hardly arguments and were not novel at all. You think that Minsky being unaware of the coercion would not be a mitigating factor in accusing him of sexual assault? When was that decided?

When he was charged it was determined that despite this possible defense there was enough evidence to convict him off knowingly committing sexual assault. It's possible he'll be found not guilty in the court of law, but it's unlikely a convicted sex offender with a harem of women is above coercion and the law likely find the defendant would more likely have known than not known.

Re: Richard Stallman resigns from CSAIL at MIT

#138

Post by partialrecall » Tue, Sep 17, 2019, 1:56 AM UTC

cannonedhamster wrote: post #123

partialrecall wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think Stallman is tactless, and I've thought that for years. That email didn't change anything I thought about him. I also think that being tactless is not a moral crime. It's aesthetically offensive and counterproductive from a leadership perspective, but being a bad leader doesn't make somebody a bad person.

It's always hard when people who built things you love have flaws. I remember my own reaction to hearing just how bad his behavior was. It's beyond the bounds of acceptable for anyone. Using his position to proposition women, handing it business cards to women he was interested in even in professional settings, defending pedophilia on his website as two consenting people when children can't functionally consent. Do I…

> "He was completely delightful when I met him in person"

Really? That's far from my experience with meeting him. I found him to be physically and socially repulsive, but intellectually fascinating.

Re: Richard Stallman resigns from CSAIL at MIT

#139

Post by rabite » Tue, Sep 17, 2019, 1:56 AM UTC

earenndil wrote: post #136

rabite wrote: post #118

Stallman is a genius and lives a life like an ancient Greek philosopher or wandering prophet. Like many brilliant people who occupy that category, he has no sense of social graces. He writes down the things he thinks. He has virtually no theory of mind, no way to perceive how the people around him are going to react to what he says. In the past, that curse has granted us with great gifts as Stallman had the boldness…

The greek philosophers had a very good understanding of social graces. They had a full understanding of the conventions which they were breaking. They chose , out of principle, to break them anyway.

yeah Diogenes masturbating and shitting in public and pissing on people is surely the sign of a man that has good social graces

Re: Richard Stallman resigns from CSAIL at MIT

#140

Post by tzs » Tue, Sep 17, 2019, 1:57 AM UTC

danso wrote: post #32

melling wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I didn’t follow the story. Was Stallman taken out of context? Anyway, he probably should have know better than to weigh in. One’s well thought out response and subtle points can often turn out to have a few holes. In fact... “If one would give me six lines written by the hand of the most honest man, I would find something in them to have him hanged”

Someone emailed an event for protesting Minsky, and Stallman accused her of wrongly inflating the term "sexual assault" when using it to refer to Minsky and Epstein. Stallman bends over backwards for Minsky, saying that he shouldn't be automatically to blame if Epstein forced someone to have sex with him. It's little different than the absurd pretzel that Lessig bent himself into when trying to defend his friend Joi…

> It's little different than the absurd pretzel that Lessig bent himself into when trying to defend his friend Joi Ito

It's massively different, because Joi Ito's interactions with Epstein were after Epstein's sexual atrocities were known. Minsky's were in 2001, which as far as I have been able to find is before Epstein was known to be evil.