His comments about women are inexcusable, but the fact he convinced Linus to adopt GPL is paying dividends to billions of people globally, and most of us don’t know it.
I don’t really know what the site stands for or their agenda, but the list is a comprehensive list of things Richard Stallman has done to discomfort women in the field
Stallman has mademanyposts sympathizing with efforts to legalize some forms of child pornography. Among other things, they stated that he was “skeptical of the claim that voluntarily [sic] pedophilia harms children”. These comments were defended by his supporters on Slashdot. As of 2016, there are reports of Stallman changing his views on the matter within the previous few years.[2] However, in 2018 he defended Cody Wilson, who later pled guilty to sex with an underage girl, with Stallman saying that the girl likely had “entirely willing sex with him.” Stallman changed his original post but nevertheless still said it is “normal for adults to be physically attracted to adolescents” and that adults using trafficked children shouldn’t be legally responsible. In 2019, Stallman posted an email to an MIT listserv about the allegation that MIT professor Marvin Minsky raped a 17-year-old girl, and due to public outcry he resigned from both MIT and the Free Software Foundation.
Minsky never raped anyone. The 17 year old girl was sent to him and politely refused. She has even confirmed this. I feel as if he goes to great lengths to speak clearly and people never seem to listen.
I do agree, however, his early views on pedophilia are creepy. I have never heard him support cp, so I won’t argue either way.
He seems to have no filter whatsoever. His comments are inexcusable but he seemed to set himself up to broadcast every single thought that ever goes through his head to the entire world. I suspect there would be some clangers in there if I - or anyone else - spewed all of their halfbaked thoughts out all the time like that.
Personally I’m never going to meet the guy and my opinion of him doesn’t particularly matter. That provides an opportunity to pick out the bits of his thoughts that I find interesting and leave out the bits that are crass. Appreciate not everyone has that luxury though, especially if they have been personally affected by one of the issues he’s crashed into like a bull in a china shop.
Honestly it comes across to me not as him defending rapists, but actually just genuinely not understanding how rape works. The guy somehow understands people less than I do, and that’s saying something.
That was my neighbor’s defense, too. “It wasn’t rape! She was very clearly coming onto me!” about the 14-year old girl he “”“encountered”“” as a college student.
He very absolutely understands what rape is. He just doesn’t want age to be a factor if she’s “into it”. It’s very very very very very clear where he stands: if she consents, it’s not rape, no matter her age!
Nobody is even accusing him of rape. Why treat him like a rapist when nobody has suggested the possibility that he had done anything wrong besides stick his foot in his mouth? It seems obvious to me that the point he was poorly attempting to make was that he’s uncomfortable with the inconsistencies around age of consent in different countries, not that there should be no such thing. 17 is enough to be a consenting adult in some actual reasonable countries.
What, do you think someone’s 18th birthday suddenly magically transforms them from a child to an adult overnight? The line has to be somewhere, and I’m perfectly happy with it being 18, but other countries having a slightly different line doesn’t make them all rapists.
I wish people would read the published mail thread and not the news articles…he never defended rapists. His quote was quite different. Also, the victim, insofar as her interaction with his old boss, confirmed what happened.
His fight for software freedom was essential for shaping technology in the last couple of decades. Basically any software today is based on open source directly or indirectly.
First, don’t listen to his opinions on anything that isn’t about comouters and software. He doesn’t have a good track record there.
Do pay attention to his takes on technology and freedom, there’s a lot of food for though there.
I was at one of his talks recently, and he’s definitely and eccentric fellow. When it comes to free software he’s a die hard extremist, and I have a feeling he knows and to a certain extent he does that on purpose. Case in point, he mentioned how he refused hearing aids and would similarly refuse a pacemaker as there are none running on free software.
As such, that’s how I take his ideas about free software: a good philosophy taken to the extreme to showcase what’d be possible if we went all in on that, and the dangers of not doing it. Definitely not something that can work for everyone, or a realistic pathway to a world of free software.
I do think, however, that someone like him is fundamental to advance the cause of free software, even if no one takes him literally and emulates his way of life.
I’m not gonna refuse a life saving treatment or device because it runs on propriety software, but I am willing to sacrifice some convenience to use a free software alternative when available.
I’m a woman, and have talked to him via email 2-3 times in the last 20 years. While I’ve met Torvalds, Jobs, and others in the industry when I was living in the Bay Area and working as a tech journalist, I never got to meet RMS – only via email. I think he has social issues, maybe he’s on the autistic side or something similar. I don’t think he understands clearly some of the things he’s saying when it comes to social stuff. He doesn’t get a pass, but at the same time, he’s a bit different as an individual, so that needs to be taken into account. When it comes to software, his heart is in the right place, and in fact, if it was me, I’d be even more strict (or more “Free” – depends how you see it), with GPL.