I know HN is generally very pro-Stallman on this issue, but I just read the (fully linked and cited) substance[1] of his behavior for the first time.
I'm now fully on-board with his resignation. It would be impossible to be comfortable working with him, especially if you had children. There's no way his presence on any team does not drive people away and tarnish the team's reputation.
Have you read the document [1] they cite as evidence that Stallman is transphobic? This is what it actually says:
> Please think about how to treat other participants with respect, especially when you disagree with them. For instance, call them by the names they use, and honor their preferences about their gender identity.
> Honoring people's preferences about gender identity includes not referring to them in ways that conflict with that identity. For instance, not to use pronouns for them that conflict with it. There are several ways to avoid that; one way is to use gender-neutral pronouns, since they don't conflict with any possible gender identity.
I have read that. Before yesterday, it was all I had read.
Have you read the article I linked? It includes many repulsive statements that have nothing to do with trans issues.
There are many instances where Stallman defended pedophilia, pedophiles, and child molestation, usually claiming that all of these things are fine if the child appears to consent.
He also criticizes people who raise children with Down's syndrome and suggests that a child with Down's syndrome is a "pet".
There are lots of people in this world with a loved one with Down's syndrome or with a history of being abused as a child. How could those people work with him? Hell, I wouldn't even want him around my children.
I agree with you that Stallman's proclivity toward making tactless and contentious statements at the worst possible times on topics that have nothing to do with Free Software make him a poor spokesperson for the FSF. I haven't yet made up my mind on whether they should bar him from being a board member.
Yet, I find it extremely questionable that the authors of <https://rms-open-letter.github.io> decided to throw in an accusation of transphobia with no apparent basis and for no apparent reason. It's a serious accusation and enough reason for me not to sign this letter. I'm not signing the support letter [1] either. I feel no need to hop on either of these bandwagons.
For what it's worth, Stallman's latest statement on pedophilia seems to be this:
> Many years ago I posted that I could not see anything wrong about sex between an adult and a child, if the child accepted it.
> Through personal conversations in recent years, I've learned to understand how sex with a child can harm per psychologically. This changed my mind about the matter: I think adults should not do that. I am grateful for the conversations that enabled me to understand why.
I can forgive the previous statements given that RMS has never done anything remotely approximating acting them out, that they've all been made quite long ago (I believe), and that RMS likely has some form of Asperger's.
>Yet, I find it extremely questionable that the authors of <https://rms-open-letter.github.io> decided to throw in an accusation of transphobia with no apparent basis and for no apparent reason.
They clearly explain the basis (Stallman's beliefs about using pronouns.) You may disagree about their reasoning, but it's disingenuous to act as if they "threw it in for no apparent reason."
I got carried away there, but at the very least they don't explain why [1] is transphobic and are generally setting the bar for transphobia quite low. There are even transgender persons that came out in support of Stallman. I find several of the personal accounts criticizing Stallman's conduct to be compelling evidence against him, and I think those accounts can stand on their own without throwing in transphobia.
> I haven't yet made up my mind on whether they should bar him from being a board member.
On second though, there's simply no reason for me to have an opinion on this at all, and the same probably goes for a lot of the people signing either of the open letters. There's even less reason for all the public condemnations that are being published by various corporations, because corporations have no moral authority.
> He also criticizes people who raise children with Down's syndrome
No, he criticises people who decide to give birth to children with Down's syndrome, when they have the option of terminating the pregnancy. And while every living human being deserves to be treated with the same dignity, wilfully deciding to bring to existence a human being with a terrible genetic handicap is simply cruel.
Both MIT and Harvard have admitted to helping Jeffrey Epstein avoid prosecution on federal racketeering charges for the sex-trafficking of minors after they were exposed by whistle-blowers at both of these institutions.
Not sure why it would be appropriate then to exclude Stallman from serving on the Board of the FSF while allowing Rafael Reif, for example, to remain president of MIT after sending a personally signed "thank-you note" to one of the most notorious alleged sex-traffickers and convicted child-rapists in US history:
So why has nobody drafted petitions to cancel Rafael Reif, Benedict "Dick" Gross, Alan "Dershbag" Dershowitz, Martin Nowak, Steven Pinker, Seth Lloyd, Neri Oxman, Frank Wilczek, and all of the other pedophilia-supporting two-faced phonies that attended Edge Foundation dinners hosted by the convicted child rapist and/or visited him on "Pedophile Isle," where FBI reportedly found instruction manuals that Mr. Epstein had ordered on Amazon that describe how to create a so-called "sex slave," in addition to video tapes containing child pornography that he allegedly recorded using secret cameras that were installed throughout his various residences?
Ito resigned. Kosslyn has repeatdly resigned as he tried to run with his tail between his legs from one university to the next as soon as he started to feel the heat (thanks to some anonymous emails).
It's time to cancel the rest of them too ... and that now includes Claudine Gay at Harvard and Martin Schmidt at MIT who signed off on allowing Nowak and Lloyd to return to their respective campuses !!!
Where is the presumption of innocence, where accusations of guilt must pass a burden of proof?
Stallman is the least 'guilty' of the people you mention, since his 'crimes' consist of the pedantic quibbling over definitions that are typical of an individual suffering from Asperger's syndrome. They are, of course, 'wooden-eared' and easily misrepresented by persons of bad faith such as the petitioners linked above. There is zero positive evidence that he advocates, or ever participated in pedophilia.
I put 'guilty' in scare-quotes because, unless there is solid evidence to the contrary, there is only guilt by association involved. Epstein was a big donor, especially to research programs in physics, and that is the basis of their association with him.
> pedantic quibbling over definitions that are typical of an individual suffering from Asperger's syndrome
I don't get why expressing (however unpopular) opinions based on rational arguments should be dismissed as "pedantic quibbling" caused by some underlying mental issue. Just consider how closed-minded, not to mention offensive, is to characterise opinions you disagree with as the product of a mental syndrome.
Besides, Stallman's opinions are not about subtle points without practical consequences. The laws and language in the US (which are, by the way, NOT always shared by the rest of the advanced world) have very practical- sometimes terrible- consequences on people's lives. So I don't think it's fair to call it "pedantic quibbling".
Stallman was responding only to the accusations against his colleague and friend, the late Prof. Marvin Minsky, not making policy prescriptions. It is clear that he did not want to believe that Prof. Minsky was guilty, and he engaged in precisely that direct and unfiltered thinking aloud that can get people who are on the autistic spectrum into trouble.
If that were the case, the "pedantic quibbling" would be exactly of the same sort that takes place every day in courts of justice- and it's at the base of our judicial system, as the right to defense from accusations. Stallman is using it to defend the reputation of a deceased friend, I think it has value.
Anyway, there are many more statements by Stallman that caused outrage, and they are about morals and public policy. And he has the full right to hold and express opinions that go against that of the majority in his time and his country, without them being dismissed as the ramblings of someone suffering from a mental disorder.
Noting that somebody has Asperger's syndrome is not an invitation to dismiss their words. Instead it provides context and insight into why they speak as they do, which furthers correct understanding of what they have said, and their motives for speaking.
I think they speak as they do for the same reasons of everyone else, i.e. because they believe it's right and relevant. If anything (my entirely intuitive, anecdotal take, for what it's worth) people with Asperger tend to be less conscious of social norms and therefore more capable of independent, original thought. Which would make their statements more valuable and less hypocritical.
I agree with you, but given that hypocrisy, indirectness and dissimulation are the norm, an approach to speaking characterized by directness, literalness, and lack of guile can easily be misinterpreted, assigned false motives, or cause upset even if understood correctly.
Ok. But then instead of trying to excuse Stallman by mentioning a possible cognitive disorder, it would make more sense to try to excuse the cancellers- after all they are those who misinterpret, assign motives without reason, and ultimately lack the ability to participate in a rational conversation.
He's never adequately explained from what I can tell why he made those statements in the first place. If he could provide that additional insight, I think it would help others evaluate the sincerity of his apology.
The question today that I have for Mr. Stallman, whom many of us hold in the highest regard for his role in the free software movement, is a very frank one: were his remarks in support of pedophilia designed to persuade Mr. Epstein to donate part of his $500 million estate to the Free Software Foundation, much like he observed role-models such as MIT president Rafael Reif do for Mr. Epstein when Dr. Reif sent Mr. Epstein a personally signed thank-you note for his donation to the Media Lab, or colleagues like Martin Nowak do for Mr. Epstein when Dr. Nowak created a web page on a university website and an office in his department for a convicted child-rapist in exchange for tens of millions of dollars in donations that were promised to his academic program at Harvard and hundreds of millions of dollars in donations, often laundered through Epstein's fellow billionaire pedophile friends like Les Wexner, Glenn Dubin, and Leon Black, to Harvard University, where Mr. Nowak is a professor?
>The question today that I have for Mr. Stallman...
...Is an accusation disguised as cross examination. It is a common technique used in courtrooms and by journalists. Such usage does not serve the interests of clarity, and we need clarity here.
If you believe that Richard Stallman, a notoriously unworldly hippie, was really motivated by greed for grant money, then you have a rather high burden of proof to surmount.
The real, and most plausible, explanation was that Stallman was horrified at the unsavory revelations concerning his good friend and colleague, Prof. Marvin Minsky, and was attempting, innocently, to defend him.
My current understanding, and I'd like to be corrected if I'm wrong here, is that Mr. Stallman's primary role at the FSF over the past decade has been to raise money for that organization, much like Rafael Reif's primary role at MIT is to raise money for the university.
I am also not asking whether he was motivated "by greed" when he made public statements that appeared to defend Epstein.
Your use of the word "greed" is a distraction away from the real question that I asked previously: were any of Mr. Stallman's statements intended to persuade Mr. Epstein to donate part of his $500 million estate to the Free Software Foundation?
That's all that I am asking here!
If his sole intention was to defend his dear friend Mr. Minsky from false accusations of raping a underage girl who was allegedly being trafficked to him by Mr. Epstein on "Pedophile Isle," then why is he attacking the law that protects underage girls from people like Mr. Epstein rather than the accuser who you claim that Mr. Stallman is not prepared to believe?
>My current understanding, and I'd like to be corrected if I'm wrong here, is that Mr. Stallman's primary role at the FSF over the past decade has been to raise money for that organization, much like Rafael Reif's primary role at MIT is to raise money for the university.
Richard Stallman's primary role was to be honorary head of the FSF, a figurehead and inspiration rather than an active participant, far more interested in upholding its philosophical and ethical basis than in practical matters.
There is a conflation here between 'role' with 'motive.' While one should expect the leaders of an organization such as the FSF to be concerned, even if only indirectly, with raising money, it does not follow that RMS had any such concern. Given his spectacular disregard for tact, diplomacy, interpersonal skills, and even bodily hygiene, RMS would appear to be singularly unsuited to any role resembling that of a lobbyist or fundraiser. Mr. Stallman is simply far to unworldly to care about money.
>were any of Mr. Stallman's statements intended to persuade Mr. Epstein to donate part of his $500 million estate to the Free Software Foundation?
Again, that is a leading question which invites the hearer to assume the truth of what is being asked, reversing the burden of proof. This is a mere rhetorical trick, not a serious question.
>If his sole intention was to defend his dear friend Mr. Minsky from false accusations of raping a underage girl who was allegedly being trafficked to him by Mr. Epstein on "Pedophile Isle," then why is he attacking the law that protects underage girls from people like Mr. Epstein rather than the accuser who you claim that Mr. Stallman is not prepared to believe?
This is another attempt to impute a motive to RMS which he simply did not have. Yes, his unguarded, over-analytic, response to the accusations against his friend provides plenty of ammunition to those who would misrepresent his position, but it cannot be said to follow that his intention was to provide cover for Epstein, and his response to the ensuing controversy linked elsewhere in this thread makes it clear that he had no such motive.
I had the opportunity and blessing to meet Dr. Stallman in person on several occasions while volunteering at FSF.
I think we've met a total of about 10 times, and spent a total of about 10-20 hours within each other's presence.
During this time, I have never, not even once, observed rms doing anything questionable, except perhaps going barefoot in the office, which I was inspired by and followed suit. (I washed my feet so that they wouldn't smell.)
In fact, on one occasion, Dr. Stallman told me that a joke I had told was mean and not funny, which was probably true, but such is Russian humor.
In my internal mental models, it affects the reputation of those working much more against rms more than rms himself.
Combined with several questionable choices in the past, e.g. deprecating human-readable onion addresses, I personally no longer consider Tor Project to be a credible organization.
In case anyone wants to know the joke, here it is, told in today's language.
A guy who had never had sex before decided to finally go for it, and went at it with a sex worker.
As it goes sometimes, he fell in love with her, and asked for her hand in marriage.
She said, I don't think it is going to work, because you are so sexually inexperienced. But the guy pleaded with her, and wouldn't leave her alone, so to get him off her back, she told him,
"Go to the woods at the side of the village, there's a tree with a hole in it. Make love to that hole for a year, then I'll marry you."
So a year later, the guy returns to ask her again. She says, Alright, let's see what you've got, and if you can satisfy me, I'll marry you. And having said this, she takes off her clothes, and turns her back to him, gets on her knees and sticks her butt out at him.
And at this, the guy lifts his leg, and front-kicks her butt so hard, she flies forward and drops to the floor.
"What the fuck are you doing, man?!" she yells at him?
And he replies, "just making sure there's no bees inside."
He's never adequately explained from what I can tell why he made those statements in the first place. If he could provide that additional insight, I think it would help others evaluate the sincerity of his apology.
The question today that I have for Mr. Stallman, whom many of us hold in the highest regard for his role in the free software movement, is a very frank one:
Were his remarks in support of pedophilia designed to persuade Mr. Epstein to donate part of his $500 million estate to the Free Software Foundation, much like he observed role-models such as MIT president Rafael Reif do for Mr. Epstein when Dr. Reif sent Mr. Epstein a personally signed thank-you note for his donation to the Media Lab, or colleagues like Martin Nowak do for Mr. Epstein when Dr. Nowak created a web page on a university website and an office in his department for a convicted child-rapist in exchange for tens of millions of dollars in donations that were promised to his academic program at Harvard and hundreds of millions of dollars in donations, often laundered through Epstein's fellow billionaire pedophile friends like Les Wexner and Glenn Dubin, to Harvard University, where Mr. Nowak is employed as a math professor?
> Stallman’s nasty comments last week drew attention to some even more appalling stuff he said back in the mid-2000s. In one 2003 post, the famed coder even wrote that “everyone age 14 or above ought to take part in sex, though not indiscriminately.”
Funny that this "even more appalling stuff" is the law in such backward places like Austria, Germany and Italy. Just slightly less uncivilised countries such as Denmark, France, Sweden, set the age of consent to 15.
To the extent that Stallman used his position at MIT and the FSF to help Jeffrey Epstein evade prosecution under the federal RICO statute for several decades by colluding with Epstein co-conspirators MIT president Rafael Reif, MIT corporation chairman Robert Millard and corporate vice presidents Morgan, Newton, Ruiz and Lucas, as well as colleagues Seth Lloyd and Marvin Minsky, in hopes of receiving the kind of money that they witnessed Epstein donate to Harvard as quid pro quo for Harvard law professor and Epstein best buddy Alan "Dershbag" Dershowitz negotiating the infamous 2011 "sweetheart deal" with federal prosecutors, that was also facilitated by Benedict "Dick" Gross, Martin Nowak, Stephen Kosslyn, Steven "Use-of-the-Internet-to-Entice-a-Minor-into-Prostitution-is-A-Okay" Stinker of a Pinker, and former Harvard president Larry "Women Can't Do Science" Summers, then that's a huge obstacle to allowing Mr. Stallman to continue to serve on the board of the FSF.
As far as the examplars you quote above, namely Austria, Germany and Italy, along with some of their collaborators during WWII, I wonder if even Epstein, Maxwell, Reif, Summers, Pinker, Kosslyn, Minsky, Oxman, Dubin, Wexner, Black, Zuckerman, and last but not least, Alan "Dershbag" Dershowitz, would approve of citing these countries as modern role models for the protection of basic human rights.
>To the extent that Stallman used his position at MIT and the FSF to help Jeffrey Epstein evade prosecution under the federal RICO statute for several decades
Can you present any evidence that Stallman did anything of the sort?
The evidence at this time is largely circumstantial:
i) Mr. Stallman's job was to raise money for the FSF.
ii) Mr. Stallman's friend and possible mentor was accused of sexual misconduct involving an underage girl who was allegedly being trafficked by Mr. Epstein on "Pedophile Isle."
iii) Mr. Stallman's statements appear more designed to justify and rationalize Mr. Epstein's sexual abuse of underage girls than to defend the reputation of his friend and possible mentor Mr. Minsky against accusations that he presumably wanted to believe were false.
iv) Mr. Stallman was presumably aware of Mr. Epstein's donations to Harvard and the reason why he was making them given the accusations that had been leveled against Mr. Epstein in the press through articles like this one:
v) Mr. Stallman presumably knows that he is a public figure who is recognized around the globe for his lifelong contribution to the free software movement, and that any statements which he makes in support of Mr. Epstein personally, or in defense of his alleged illegal behavior, could be seized upon by attorneys like Mr. Dershowitz to help Mr. Epstein negotiate his next "sweetheart deal," much like Mr. Epstein's "CIA connection" was used to bamboozle federal prosecutors for the first deal.
Regarding this last bullet point, do realize that this was exactly what Mr. Reif was doing for Mr. Epstein when he handed him that personally signed thank-you note that has caused so much public outcry and calls for his resignation.
By the way, Reif's thank-you note is also eerily similar to what happened here:
Note that in this case, pedophile prize-winning author Gabriel Matzneff received his "thank-you" note not from the president of MIT, but from the former president of France!
Matzneff openly bragged about taking multiple eight year-old boys to bed that he picked up at a shopping plaza in the Philippines so that he could enjoy sexually abusing them all at the same time, to only then celebrate it in one of his most despicable novels, and like Epstein, he also managed to evade prosecution for these crimes over the course of several decades, because he had his set of "protectors" sitting in powerful places too.
So Stallman should think about answering his critics at the appropriate time, because it sure as hell looks like he was providing "reputation laundering" for Mr. Epstein along with MIT president Rafael Reif, and in the court of public opinion, what Mr. Stallman has hopefully learned by now is that circumstantial evidence is often all that's needed to convict.
i) False. Richard Stallman's primary concern is with the philosophy and ethics of free software. He has never shown any notable concern with money.
ii) True, but has no bearing on Richard Stallman's character or motives. It invites guilt by association.
iii) False. I take issue with the expression 'more designed' That imputes a motive to Mr. Stallman to the effect that he was deliberately and specifically covering for Epstein rather than reacting spontaneously to learning of the accusations against Marvin Minsky.
iv) Mr. Stallman may or may not have been aware of Mr. Epstein's largess, but given Mr. Stallman's known lack of concern with money, it cannot be inferred that he had any interest in soliciting donations.
v) Mr. Stallman is surely aware that he is a public figure, but that does not change the fact that he is no politician or diplomat, but a nerd who is more comfortable with computers.
>and that any statements which he makes in support of Mr. Epstein personally, or in defense of his alleged illegal behavior
Richard Stallman has made no statements in defense of Mr. Epstein personally. A case could be made that his ill-chosen words could provide cover indirectly for the activities of Mr. Epstein, but that is not the same thing.
The rest of this argument is sensationalist and irrelevant.
>He's never adequately explained from what I can tell why he made those statements in the first place. If he could provide that additional insight, I think it would help others evaluate the sincerity of his apology.
I don't think it's relevant to his work.
And if anything I said caused such a reaction from the public, I wouldn't say anything else about it either. It just is not likely to help anything.
They care more about woke politics then about tor or foss or even science. Fake diversity is disgusting. Stallman is a good dude. Body dismorphia is real and can be very successfully treated. Trust the science.
I find the evidence presented by <https://rms-open-letter.github.io> for Stallman being transphobic absurd. They are citing this document [1]. Here's what it actually says:
> Please think about how to treat other participants with respect, especially when you disagree with them. For instance, call them by the names they use, and honor their preferences about their gender identity.
> Honoring people's preferences about gender identity includes not referring to them in ways that conflict with that identity. For instance, not to use pronouns for them that conflict with it. There are several ways to avoid that; one way is to use gender-neutral pronouns, since they don't conflict with any possible gender identity.
Those statements apparently make Stallman a transphobe.
37 comments
[ 5.5 ms ] story [ 101 ms ] threadI'm now fully on-board with his resignation. It would be impossible to be comfortable working with him, especially if you had children. There's no way his presence on any team does not drive people away and tarnish the team's reputation.
1. https://rms-open-letter.github.io/appendix
> Please think about how to treat other participants with respect, especially when you disagree with them. For instance, call them by the names they use, and honor their preferences about their gender identity.
> Honoring people's preferences about gender identity includes not referring to them in ways that conflict with that identity. For instance, not to use pronouns for them that conflict with it. There are several ways to avoid that; one way is to use gender-neutral pronouns, since they don't conflict with any possible gender identity.
That apparently makes Stallman a transphobe.
[1]: https://web.archive.org/web/20210325014959/https://www.gnu.o...
Have you read the article I linked? It includes many repulsive statements that have nothing to do with trans issues.
There are many instances where Stallman defended pedophilia, pedophiles, and child molestation, usually claiming that all of these things are fine if the child appears to consent.
He also criticizes people who raise children with Down's syndrome and suggests that a child with Down's syndrome is a "pet".
There are lots of people in this world with a loved one with Down's syndrome or with a history of being abused as a child. How could those people work with him? Hell, I wouldn't even want him around my children.
Yet, I find it extremely questionable that the authors of <https://rms-open-letter.github.io> decided to throw in an accusation of transphobia with no apparent basis and for no apparent reason. It's a serious accusation and enough reason for me not to sign this letter. I'm not signing the support letter [1] either. I feel no need to hop on either of these bandwagons.
For what it's worth, Stallman's latest statement on pedophilia seems to be this:
> Many years ago I posted that I could not see anything wrong about sex between an adult and a child, if the child accepted it.
> Through personal conversations in recent years, I've learned to understand how sex with a child can harm per psychologically. This changed my mind about the matter: I think adults should not do that. I am grateful for the conversations that enabled me to understand why.
I can forgive the previous statements given that RMS has never done anything remotely approximating acting them out, that they've all been made quite long ago (I believe), and that RMS likely has some form of Asperger's.
[1]: https://rms-support-letter.github.io/
They clearly explain the basis (Stallman's beliefs about using pronouns.) You may disagree about their reasoning, but it's disingenuous to act as if they "threw it in for no apparent reason."
[1]: https://web.archive.org/web/20210325014959/https://www.gnu.o...
On second though, there's simply no reason for me to have an opinion on this at all, and the same probably goes for a lot of the people signing either of the open letters. There's even less reason for all the public condemnations that are being published by various corporations, because corporations have no moral authority.
No, he criticises people who decide to give birth to children with Down's syndrome, when they have the option of terminating the pregnancy. And while every living human being deserves to be treated with the same dignity, wilfully deciding to bring to existence a human being with a terrible genetic handicap is simply cruel.
Why? I have two kids and if RMS ever comes back to talk at my lab, I'm definitely bringing them to see him!
Not sure why it would be appropriate then to exclude Stallman from serving on the Board of the FSF while allowing Rafael Reif, for example, to remain president of MIT after sending a personally signed "thank-you note" to one of the most notorious alleged sex-traffickers and convicted child-rapists in US history:
https://www.bostonglobe.com/business/2020/01/12/after-epstei...
Nor would it be any more appropriate to allow Mr. Seth Lloyd back onto the MIT campus with just a slap on the wrist:
https://thetech.com/2021/02/25/mit-administration-epstein-op...
Or Mr. Martin "Punishment Serves No Noble Purpose" Nowak for that matter either:
https://www.bostonglobe.com/2021/03/26/metro/harvard-sanctio...
This hacker news thread on Nowak is worth reading again:
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25442060
So why has nobody drafted petitions to cancel Rafael Reif, Benedict "Dick" Gross, Alan "Dershbag" Dershowitz, Martin Nowak, Steven Pinker, Seth Lloyd, Neri Oxman, Frank Wilczek, and all of the other pedophilia-supporting two-faced phonies that attended Edge Foundation dinners hosted by the convicted child rapist and/or visited him on "Pedophile Isle," where FBI reportedly found instruction manuals that Mr. Epstein had ordered on Amazon that describe how to create a so-called "sex slave," in addition to video tapes containing child pornography that he allegedly recorded using secret cameras that were installed throughout his various residences?
Ito resigned. Kosslyn has repeatdly resigned as he tried to run with his tail between his legs from one university to the next as soon as he started to feel the heat (thanks to some anonymous emails).
It's time to cancel the rest of them too ... and that now includes Claudine Gay at Harvard and Martin Schmidt at MIT who signed off on allowing Nowak and Lloyd to return to their respective campuses !!!
Stallman is the least 'guilty' of the people you mention, since his 'crimes' consist of the pedantic quibbling over definitions that are typical of an individual suffering from Asperger's syndrome. They are, of course, 'wooden-eared' and easily misrepresented by persons of bad faith such as the petitioners linked above. There is zero positive evidence that he advocates, or ever participated in pedophilia.
I put 'guilty' in scare-quotes because, unless there is solid evidence to the contrary, there is only guilt by association involved. Epstein was a big donor, especially to research programs in physics, and that is the basis of their association with him.
> pedantic quibbling over definitions that are typical of an individual suffering from Asperger's syndrome
I don't get why expressing (however unpopular) opinions based on rational arguments should be dismissed as "pedantic quibbling" caused by some underlying mental issue. Just consider how closed-minded, not to mention offensive, is to characterise opinions you disagree with as the product of a mental syndrome.
Besides, Stallman's opinions are not about subtle points without practical consequences. The laws and language in the US (which are, by the way, NOT always shared by the rest of the advanced world) have very practical- sometimes terrible- consequences on people's lives. So I don't think it's fair to call it "pedantic quibbling".
Anyway, there are many more statements by Stallman that caused outrage, and they are about morals and public policy. And he has the full right to hold and express opinions that go against that of the majority in his time and his country, without them being dismissed as the ramblings of someone suffering from a mental disorder.
He's never adequately explained from what I can tell why he made those statements in the first place. If he could provide that additional insight, I think it would help others evaluate the sincerity of his apology.
The question today that I have for Mr. Stallman, whom many of us hold in the highest regard for his role in the free software movement, is a very frank one: were his remarks in support of pedophilia designed to persuade Mr. Epstein to donate part of his $500 million estate to the Free Software Foundation, much like he observed role-models such as MIT president Rafael Reif do for Mr. Epstein when Dr. Reif sent Mr. Epstein a personally signed thank-you note for his donation to the Media Lab, or colleagues like Martin Nowak do for Mr. Epstein when Dr. Nowak created a web page on a university website and an office in his department for a convicted child-rapist in exchange for tens of millions of dollars in donations that were promised to his academic program at Harvard and hundreds of millions of dollars in donations, often laundered through Epstein's fellow billionaire pedophile friends like Les Wexner, Glenn Dubin, and Leon Black, to Harvard University, where Mr. Nowak is a professor?
...Is an accusation disguised as cross examination. It is a common technique used in courtrooms and by journalists. Such usage does not serve the interests of clarity, and we need clarity here.
If you believe that Richard Stallman, a notoriously unworldly hippie, was really motivated by greed for grant money, then you have a rather high burden of proof to surmount.
The real, and most plausible, explanation was that Stallman was horrified at the unsavory revelations concerning his good friend and colleague, Prof. Marvin Minsky, and was attempting, innocently, to defend him.
I am also not asking whether he was motivated "by greed" when he made public statements that appeared to defend Epstein.
Your use of the word "greed" is a distraction away from the real question that I asked previously: were any of Mr. Stallman's statements intended to persuade Mr. Epstein to donate part of his $500 million estate to the Free Software Foundation?
That's all that I am asking here!
If his sole intention was to defend his dear friend Mr. Minsky from false accusations of raping a underage girl who was allegedly being trafficked to him by Mr. Epstein on "Pedophile Isle," then why is he attacking the law that protects underage girls from people like Mr. Epstein rather than the accuser who you claim that Mr. Stallman is not prepared to believe?
Richard Stallman's primary role was to be honorary head of the FSF, a figurehead and inspiration rather than an active participant, far more interested in upholding its philosophical and ethical basis than in practical matters.
There is a conflation here between 'role' with 'motive.' While one should expect the leaders of an organization such as the FSF to be concerned, even if only indirectly, with raising money, it does not follow that RMS had any such concern. Given his spectacular disregard for tact, diplomacy, interpersonal skills, and even bodily hygiene, RMS would appear to be singularly unsuited to any role resembling that of a lobbyist or fundraiser. Mr. Stallman is simply far to unworldly to care about money.
>were any of Mr. Stallman's statements intended to persuade Mr. Epstein to donate part of his $500 million estate to the Free Software Foundation?
Again, that is a leading question which invites the hearer to assume the truth of what is being asked, reversing the burden of proof. This is a mere rhetorical trick, not a serious question.
>If his sole intention was to defend his dear friend Mr. Minsky from false accusations of raping a underage girl who was allegedly being trafficked to him by Mr. Epstein on "Pedophile Isle," then why is he attacking the law that protects underage girls from people like Mr. Epstein rather than the accuser who you claim that Mr. Stallman is not prepared to believe?
This is another attempt to impute a motive to RMS which he simply did not have. Yes, his unguarded, over-analytic, response to the accusations against his friend provides plenty of ammunition to those who would misrepresent his position, but it cannot be said to follow that his intention was to provide cover for Epstein, and his response to the ensuing controversy linked elsewhere in this thread makes it clear that he had no such motive.
I think we've met a total of about 10 times, and spent a total of about 10-20 hours within each other's presence.
During this time, I have never, not even once, observed rms doing anything questionable, except perhaps going barefoot in the office, which I was inspired by and followed suit. (I washed my feet so that they wouldn't smell.)
In fact, on one occasion, Dr. Stallman told me that a joke I had told was mean and not funny, which was probably true, but such is Russian humor.
In my internal mental models, it affects the reputation of those working much more against rms more than rms himself.
Combined with several questionable choices in the past, e.g. deprecating human-readable onion addresses, I personally no longer consider Tor Project to be a credible organization.
A guy who had never had sex before decided to finally go for it, and went at it with a sex worker.
As it goes sometimes, he fell in love with her, and asked for her hand in marriage.
She said, I don't think it is going to work, because you are so sexually inexperienced. But the guy pleaded with her, and wouldn't leave her alone, so to get him off her back, she told him,
"Go to the woods at the side of the village, there's a tree with a hole in it. Make love to that hole for a year, then I'll marry you."
So a year later, the guy returns to ask her again. She says, Alright, let's see what you've got, and if you can satisfy me, I'll marry you. And having said this, she takes off her clothes, and turns her back to him, gets on her knees and sticks her butt out at him.
And at this, the guy lifts his leg, and front-kicks her butt so hard, she flies forward and drops to the floor.
"What the fuck are you doing, man?!" she yells at him?
And he replies, "just making sure there's no bees inside."
He's never adequately explained from what I can tell why he made those statements in the first place. If he could provide that additional insight, I think it would help others evaluate the sincerity of his apology.
The question today that I have for Mr. Stallman, whom many of us hold in the highest regard for his role in the free software movement, is a very frank one:
Were his remarks in support of pedophilia designed to persuade Mr. Epstein to donate part of his $500 million estate to the Free Software Foundation, much like he observed role-models such as MIT president Rafael Reif do for Mr. Epstein when Dr. Reif sent Mr. Epstein a personally signed thank-you note for his donation to the Media Lab, or colleagues like Martin Nowak do for Mr. Epstein when Dr. Nowak created a web page on a university website and an office in his department for a convicted child-rapist in exchange for tens of millions of dollars in donations that were promised to his academic program at Harvard and hundreds of millions of dollars in donations, often laundered through Epstein's fellow billionaire pedophile friends like Les Wexner and Glenn Dubin, to Harvard University, where Mr. Nowak is employed as a math professor?
> Stallman’s nasty comments last week drew attention to some even more appalling stuff he said back in the mid-2000s. In one 2003 post, the famed coder even wrote that “everyone age 14 or above ought to take part in sex, though not indiscriminately.”
Funny that this "even more appalling stuff" is the law in such backward places like Austria, Germany and Italy. Just slightly less uncivilised countries such as Denmark, France, Sweden, set the age of consent to 15.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ages_of_consent_in_Europe
As far as the examplars you quote above, namely Austria, Germany and Italy, along with some of their collaborators during WWII, I wonder if even Epstein, Maxwell, Reif, Summers, Pinker, Kosslyn, Minsky, Oxman, Dubin, Wexner, Black, Zuckerman, and last but not least, Alan "Dershbag" Dershowitz, would approve of citing these countries as modern role models for the protection of basic human rights.
Can you present any evidence that Stallman did anything of the sort?
i) Mr. Stallman's job was to raise money for the FSF.
ii) Mr. Stallman's friend and possible mentor was accused of sexual misconduct involving an underage girl who was allegedly being trafficked by Mr. Epstein on "Pedophile Isle."
iii) Mr. Stallman's statements appear more designed to justify and rationalize Mr. Epstein's sexual abuse of underage girls than to defend the reputation of his friend and possible mentor Mr. Minsky against accusations that he presumably wanted to believe were false.
iv) Mr. Stallman was presumably aware of Mr. Epstein's donations to Harvard and the reason why he was making them given the accusations that had been leveled against Mr. Epstein in the press through articles like this one:
https://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/03/us/03epstein.html
v) Mr. Stallman presumably knows that he is a public figure who is recognized around the globe for his lifelong contribution to the free software movement, and that any statements which he makes in support of Mr. Epstein personally, or in defense of his alleged illegal behavior, could be seized upon by attorneys like Mr. Dershowitz to help Mr. Epstein negotiate his next "sweetheart deal," much like Mr. Epstein's "CIA connection" was used to bamboozle federal prosecutors for the first deal.
Regarding this last bullet point, do realize that this was exactly what Mr. Reif was doing for Mr. Epstein when he handed him that personally signed thank-you note that has caused so much public outcry and calls for his resignation.
By the way, Reif's thank-you note is also eerily similar to what happened here:
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/11/world/europe/gabriel-matz...
Note that in this case, pedophile prize-winning author Gabriel Matzneff received his "thank-you" note not from the president of MIT, but from the former president of France!
Matzneff openly bragged about taking multiple eight year-old boys to bed that he picked up at a shopping plaza in the Philippines so that he could enjoy sexually abusing them all at the same time, to only then celebrate it in one of his most despicable novels, and like Epstein, he also managed to evade prosecution for these crimes over the course of several decades, because he had his set of "protectors" sitting in powerful places too.
So Stallman should think about answering his critics at the appropriate time, because it sure as hell looks like he was providing "reputation laundering" for Mr. Epstein along with MIT president Rafael Reif, and in the court of public opinion, what Mr. Stallman has hopefully learned by now is that circumstantial evidence is often all that's needed to convict.
ii) True, but has no bearing on Richard Stallman's character or motives. It invites guilt by association.
iii) False. I take issue with the expression 'more designed' That imputes a motive to Mr. Stallman to the effect that he was deliberately and specifically covering for Epstein rather than reacting spontaneously to learning of the accusations against Marvin Minsky.
iv) Mr. Stallman may or may not have been aware of Mr. Epstein's largess, but given Mr. Stallman's known lack of concern with money, it cannot be inferred that he had any interest in soliciting donations.
v) Mr. Stallman is surely aware that he is a public figure, but that does not change the fact that he is no politician or diplomat, but a nerd who is more comfortable with computers.
>and that any statements which he makes in support of Mr. Epstein personally, or in defense of his alleged illegal behavior
Richard Stallman has made no statements in defense of Mr. Epstein personally. A case could be made that his ill-chosen words could provide cover indirectly for the activities of Mr. Epstein, but that is not the same thing.
The rest of this argument is sensationalist and irrelevant.
I don't think it's relevant to his work.
And if anything I said caused such a reaction from the public, I wouldn't say anything else about it either. It just is not likely to help anything.
Anyway, just signed rms support letter [1] and suggest you do the same.
[1]: https://github.com/rms-support-letter/rms-support-letter.git...
> Please think about how to treat other participants with respect, especially when you disagree with them. For instance, call them by the names they use, and honor their preferences about their gender identity.
> Honoring people's preferences about gender identity includes not referring to them in ways that conflict with that identity. For instance, not to use pronouns for them that conflict with it. There are several ways to avoid that; one way is to use gender-neutral pronouns, since they don't conflict with any possible gender identity.
Those statements apparently make Stallman a transphobe.
[1]: https://web.archive.org/web/20210325014959/https://www.gnu.o...