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John Sullivan resign as executive director of the Free Software Foundation

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Re: John Sullivan resign as executive director of the Free Software Foundation

#301

Post by mandmandam »

gimboland wrote: post #29
risky_opinions wrote: post #9

I'm creating a throwaway that I hope won't irk dang. If this breaks the rules, I'm sorry and I'll stop. Richard Stallman single-handedly created the free software movement, and he's the reason we all have jobs. Google and Facebook might not have been possible in a world where you couldn't spin up a server for free and compile code without paying a license. Richard Stallman has said some sexist and edgy things. He als…

> I don't want to live in a world where we can't be forgiven. Forgiveness requires accountability and commitment to change, neither of which have been forthcoming.

Stallman lost his job for years, and apologised - what are you talking about?

And this is over - and I can't BELIEVE this still has to be said even here - his words being twisted COMPLETELY out of context.

Smh at this community for tolerating comments like yours.

Re: John Sullivan resign as executive director of the Free Software Foundation

#302

Post by [deleted] »

Shish2k wrote: post #221
aboringusername wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I don't want to live in a world without American freedom of speech - where we can't be blunt and speak our minds. I take issue with this. I'm not hugely adept at history but from my understanding there has never been a time where you can just blurt out a communication and have it be "accepted" by society - this seems to me very American and appears very detached from reality and real world experience. Yes, you are…

> None of these things are new to humanity The speed and the scale at which “a random throwaway comment to a friend” can be taken out of context and used to ruin a person’s life are pretty new

[deleted]

Re: John Sullivan resign as executive director of the Free Software Foundation

#303

Post by mandmandam »

Daho0n wrote: post #278
arpinum wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

RMS does not have the skillset needed for a leadership position today. If you care about the movement, it needs a leader people want to follow. Just because RMS is not at the top doesn't mean he is being denied chances and isn't forgiven. I'm sure he can continue writing code. He just isn't good enough as a leader of a broad movement. That isn't a slight, most of us couldn't do it.

I couldn't disagree more. To replace RMS is one thing but to replace him because of woke cancel culture is another. I'd vote for knowledge and skills, not speaking skills and a history of never having said something the woke crowed gets pissy over.

It's astounding people aren't grasping this point, even now.

Re: John Sullivan resign as executive director of the Free Software Foundation

#304

Post by simion314 »

dfcowell wrote: post #104
simion314 wrote: post #55

We almost Linus Torwalds because of the cancel culture, would be a big loss to lose RMS because he is no longer good PR to have him, bonus points if some big business like Google or Red Hat could grab the leadership of FSF and GNU. There was a few days back a post for people to support RMS and I admit I did not put my name on the list because i am afraid this could affect my future, cancel culture could get worse and…

I think the difference here is that Linus was at least self-aware, humble or critical enough of a thinker to realize that his behavior was problematic, state the fact plainly and take responsibility for changing it for the good of the community. RMS has been unrepentantly stubborn, famously intolerant of differing views and has not demonstrated a desire to change.

This is false, RMS changed is opinion on that sensitive topic and on the other issues so far I only read things like "X said that 20 years ago RMS did Y and X felt uncomfortable" , what should he do?

The other difference between Linus and RMS is that RMS is the GPL guy and many people on HN hate GPL with a passion and will spread FUD about the license any chance they get, I think this RMS controversy is fueled by the GPL/free software hate.

Re: John Sullivan resign as executive director of the Free Software Foundation

#305

Post by mandmandam »

arpinum wrote: post #165
tjpnz wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>RMS does not have the skillset needed for a leadership position today. Care to define what that skillset is? Leadership requires all sorts of skills and some of the most effective leaders I've seen share very little in common.

#1 - People want to follow you.

What you are describing is actually a popularity contest, not leadership.

I can see why you would be mistaken for confusing the two these days - it seems to be an insanely common misconception - but they are NOT the same thing and never will be.

Re: John Sullivan resign as executive director of the Free Software Foundation

#306

Post by jhugo »

orra wrote: post #250
jhugo wrote: post #226

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Knowing very little about this issue, this seems like a minefield. I have met many people whose native language doesn't have gendered pronouns, who make mistakes constantly when trying to use them in English and eventually learn to use "they" consistently to avoid getting it wrong. According to this standard, they would be being disrespectful whenever they meet someone with a strong preference about their pronoun, ev…

> According to this standard, they would be being disrespectful whenever they meet someone with a strong preference about their pronoun, even if they had no knowledge of the preference. No, the point is to use somebody's preferred pronouns once you know them. My complaint is the GNU guidelines explicitly allow you to not correctly pronoun/gender somebody, once you know their gender identity. Re non-native speakers, e…

I think we agree - but I do notice that there often seems to be a lot of "assumption of intent". (The below is general in nature and not related to the article from which this thread grew.)

I've had >30 years of conditioning to select the pronoun according to the physical appearance of the person I'm referring to. Until last year, the concept of a person stating a preference of pronoun and expecting me to follow that preference had never crossed my mind. I simply had never been exposed to the concept. I make no judgement about whether that is the "right" way; I merely assert that this is the way I have learned. Since I was exposed to the concept, I have tried to understand it better and do my best to use the pronouns a person wants me to use, though I am by no means perfect at this.

A person whose native language does not have gendered pronouns has potentially spent their entire life using neutral pronouns without consideration to the apparent gender of the person they are referring to, and the concept of that person having a preference of pronoun is likely completely foreign to them, too.

Given that, it seems reasonable that a sudden shift in societal expectations of people, namely that they should learn the pronouns of others and correctly and consistently use them, should be coupled with a recognition that people are likely to make many mistakes whilst adjusting to this shift, and therefore good faith should be assumed unless there are indications to suggest otherwise.

Re: John Sullivan resign as executive director of the Free Software Foundation

#307

Post by the-dude »

tcbawo wrote: post #283
the-dude wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The environment is profoundly different today than say, 40 years ago. Being different is much easier today. I was seduced by my parents to join a Judo club so I could stand up to myself ( this works wonders ). Last year, I confronted a new millenial neighbour of mine repeatedly on her behaviour of biking on the sidewalk. The biggest problem was she was doing blind corners as well. There are small children here playin…

When the police came, what happened?

If you don't have an appointment, I don't answer the door. I was not called into the bureau.

Re: John Sullivan resign as executive director of the Free Software Foundation

#308

Post by willeh »

mpol wrote: post #249
willeh wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hope that I'm wrong here and there is evidence of actual bots, but as far as I can tell you're making this judgement based on the fact the people signing the RMS support letter have Russian sounding names. First off, yes I don't doubt that the totalitarian oppressive and oppressive governments are using this type of technique, in fact they are probably using it a lot because it is highly effective. However, it seem…

"in my experience Russians tend to be slightly technocratic valuing pragmatism over ideology" Strange, I always experienced the FSF as ideological and Linux as pragmatical with their grey areas of closed drivers. This reads like the world upside-down :) Is Copyleft Free Software suddenly pragmatic? No offense, mostly just curious.

None taken. My comment wasn't necessarily about Free vs Open source software, but about leaders for the free software movement. From my point of view RMS seems like a strong leader from a technocratic perspective, he has written significant portions of the code for the GNU "operating system" and of course is still the leader of the GNU project. His means of accomplishing his political goals are practical - writing software with copyleft licences and boycotting other alternatives. To accept RMS as a leader we must take a technocratic view we ignore everything but his performance, in a narrow sense.

I myself am no fan of RMS (although I'm also critical of the way he was "cancelled") so it is much harder to put justification for an opinion I don't share to paper but I hope this clears up my previous post somewhat.

Re: John Sullivan resign as executive director of the Free Software Foundation

#309

Post by hutzlibu »

Daho0n wrote: post #260
hutzlibu wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So with your martial arts training you confronted your neighbour - and she called the police? Well, maybe you should try talking calmly next time, then maybe others feel not threatened enough to call the police. Otherwise you have the right to call the police if she insists on being a threat to the children around.

A confrontation with "martial arts training" is being mindful and resting in yourself. You try to make it sound like it is behaving aggressively and ready for violence. That's the opposite of what you learn and the risk of someone behaving like this is way higher in those without martial arts training. Besides, I bet you are fully aware that the point GP was making was that his training made him dare say something wh…

I train martial arts since being a small boy and no one ever called the police because of me. So I am not sure about that:

"Besides, I bet you are fully aware that the point GP was making was that his training made him dare say something where he before wouldn't. "

And I know a lot of people, bolstering their martial arts skills to impress and supress people. Once or twice I had to restrain some.

Still - repeatedly engaged talking to someone who don't wants to be talked with - can be defined as harrasment either way. And close to self justice in this case.

I know the urge for it sometimes. But .. that just means trouble.

(side note: Judo is not very effective as self defence)

Re: John Sullivan resign as executive director of the Free Software Foundation

#310

Post by temac »

bsagdiyev wrote: post #227
michaelsbradley wrote: post #190

Seems creepy: https://github.com/sticks-stuff/highlight-RMS-supporters

Not sure why this is greyed. This sort of stuff is childish, especially coming from adults. Well I guess they’re more “adults” at this point if this is how they treat people who disagree with them.

This is not "childish", this is the essence of the actions done by the people the drama originated from : when a target has been found, the idea is to ostracize them, and any of their "support", interpreted as including those who disagree on some point with the target but think the mob is going too far, and in extreme cases, selectively those who did not take a public position. This is the very object of the RMS open letter : they openly want RMS to disappear from everywhere and the whole FSF board to resign.

There is still hope at some organization level, if they have strong constitutions, for example Debian has called for a vote among their members and is not threatening, officially, "dissident" people of being ostracized. Maybe "individually" some members will fall in that trap against others (in quote because the individual aspect will often not just be them avoiding intetaction, but them actively trying by openly or covertly pressuring everybody to prevent interactions between others, like we see here)

The sad part is that this guerilla is highly assymetrical. Benevolent and correctly functioning adults won't even try to cancel the cancellers, or to make transitive lists of who can not be talked to anymore, because how would that be better than what they are doing? Of course some declaring support for cancelled people will attempt a counter boycott but their stance is not reasonable and they should be ignored as well on this point.

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