But look past that into what was happening.
Stallman was trying to defend Minsky who had sex with someone, a teenager, nearly 60 years younger than him on a billionaire's private island. There isn't an imaginable circumstance where what happened there was not, even in the best possible light, incredibly creepy.
His intellectual arguments were understandable in a way, but in the context of defending Minsky and in the venue they were wildly inappropriate and indefensible.
It doesn't matter how "great" you are or how socially awkward, any institution should fire you for doing something like that.
Comments here seem to mostly equate this situation to a Cancel Culture outcry over an isolated remark. That's not what happened here. rms has had decades of inexcusable behavior for any individual, much less someone affiliated with MIT and heading something as large as FSF. He had to answer for this eventually.
I sincerely appreciate his contributions to this world. But I also sincerely feel that we can't give people free passes for their behavior (see: courtesy cards at conferences) just because they've done well in other respects. We need to end the acceptance of Brilliant Jerks.
That seems reasonable and fair.
> I agree that we need to turn around acceptance of "brilliant jerks" but the Law of Unintended Consequence here in many cases seems way worse than the original problem we were trying to solve.
Which is... what exactly? You're appealing to a slippery slope but from my perspective we climbed UP said slope to get to holding RMS to account for years of bad behavior, and even now reprehensible folks are using awful excuses like, "They're just on the spectrum" as ammo in the "Yes but he's a powerful man" argument they've been winning for a long time.
We don’t need to worry about his entire life. That’s his job. We can say “this person clearly should not be leading an advocacy group” without figuring out a whole future career path for him.
They certainly _shouldn't_ be in a leadership position... (where that "inexcusable behavior" becomes a barrier to participation for various groups)
are you even thinking about what you're writing? it seems like you're just attacking for the sake of it.
you've spammed this conversation with your input... what, 20 different times?
I hate this morality police sweeping in saying that he simply can’t talk about this because it is forbidden, wrong, etc. The majority should not decide what is ok speech or thought, we should judge him by what he has actually done, and challenge his thoughts directly with reasoned argument rather than immediately dismiss and denounce anything that isn’t in the moral majority.
Freedom of association is just as important at freedom of speech.
All acts of pedophilia would be statutory rape, but not all statutory rape would be acts of pedophilia. If the minor isn't a pre-pubescent child, it really isn't pedophilia.
I get that the concept of assumption of innocence is something long-forgotten on the Internet, but can we at least discern between correcting the language to ensure that mob accusations are accurate, and wholesale defense of a (presumed) act?
Is your problem with the person who had the sex, or the person defending them? The former I agree is a huge problem, the latter seems highly dangerous and I very much disagree with you. It would be impossible to get any sort of due process or fair trial if even defending you makes you toxic, unemployable, and evil. What if you are innocent? Imagine trying to find a lawyer...
What about me? I'm not defending RMS' behavior, but I could see how someone would think I was. Do I deserve to be able to work? Do my kids deserve a home and food on the table?
Some people like Greg Benford claimed the sex didn't happen. I think that's a better way to go about it. Say you were present at the time and provide counter-claim.
Now, there doesn't seem to be proof either way.
Then why attack him now and try to force him out of the organisation that he founded over something people misunderstood? They could just call to fire him over actual abusive behaviour instead.
You're happy to benefit from the freedoms he fought for, the free GNU, built by GCC, and GPL licensed software that runs on your computer, your car, your phone, and your TV, and all the platforms you use on the internet (including this one). But you won't accept any Brilliant Jerks! I'm sure you'll put your money where your mouth is, and boycott all of these.
And while you're at it, why don't you list your numerous noteworthy accomplishments in life, and pinky-swear that you've never said anything in public that you regretted.
That's blowing it way out of proportion. You mention one remark 13 years ago, and refer to it as decades.
RMS points out that she did not ever say that she and Minksy had sex, although the prosecutor implied it, and there was a witness account that Minsky declined and warned someone else about what happened during the event. Pointing this out should not be a problem.
So please look past the media's witch hunt and into what's actually been said.
[1]https://assets.documentcloud.org/documents/6405929/091320191...
He didn't redefine the legal term, he just (tl;dr) said it sucks and we shouldn't use it (and instead should use something more specific).
That part of my comment was overly sarcastic. I have to apologize for that.
> He said that sexual assault is a poor term, for reasons of broadness and vagueness, and that we should avoid using such terms in order to avoid ambiguity.
I would say that the term is intentionally broad and vague precisely because violence is only one of many ways to force an unwilling participant and how it was done is mostly irrelevant to the end result.
> he just (tl;dr) said it sucks and we shouldn't use it (and instead should use something more specific).
As far as I can tell he never actually brought up a more specific term and just disagreed in a rather non constructive fashion against the use of both sexual assault and rape, even when someone explicitly referred to laws.
Doesn't matter if the accused event happened or not. Defending the hypothetical in that manner gets you fired.
However I can’t seem to find the original documents to verify that.
And reading too much about Giuffre, my god. The list of powerful people.
Epstein must of had blackmail on everyone.
Almost like a cartel leader in their nation, he made big philanthropic donations for good press and then kept many of the world’s richest and most powerful people under his thumb.
Why the hell the Media never puts up links to direct sources is what frustrates me the most. There's been some bad cases of this lately.
The analysis and statements in the articles were often ridiculous and had little connection to the original material (even the article publishing that material) other than exaggerating someone else's article in a perverse game of telephone.
Minksy DIDN'T had the sex.
What the court documents said is:
A woman, that at the time was 17, said Epstein told her to OFFER sex to Minsky.
And another person that was present, Greg Benford, said that Minsky refused the offer.
Nowhere was stated that sex happened.
Here for example https://techcrunch.com/2019/09/16/computer-scientist-richard...
It went from "defended Minsky", to "Victims Were ‘Entirely Willing’" to "defended Epstein".
> Stallman was trying to defend Minsky who had sex with someone
I think that he was just trying to be rational. But being rational against a lynching mob is not a good idea (and hasn't ever been in human history).
> but in the context of defending Minsky and in the venue they were wildly inappropriate and indefensible
Would you mind expanding on that? Say that someone claimed that Stalin drank the blood of his victims, would it be "inappropriate and indefensible" to try to debunk such a claim (and thus defend Stalin) in the process?
No one in a position to cause this outcome didn't read the original statements. Suggesting that this is all a big misunderstanding (or that this was an isolated incident of RMS's sexism, for that matter) is not only slanderous, but its profoundly disrespectful to all parties.
With what sentence?
> was suggesting that minors can consent to sex with adults
Legally in most places they can, legally in the place that this happened I think that they could not. Is there a problem with this statement?
> suggesting a young woman forced into sexual servitude by a monstrous sex slave merchant was "entirely willing."
Appeared entirely willing (to Minsky and to anyone else that Epstein invited in his island) != being entirely willing herself.
> RMS's sexism
Would you mind showing to me where is the sexism in anything that Stallman said regarding Epstein?
It's an interesting point given that there actually is a certain strain of Stalin's apologists that reply to any critique of their idol with "yeah, and he also drank blood and ate little children for breakfast".
The problem is defending a man accused of statutory rape by saying his accuser appeared willing. Everything else is irrelevant.
And it wasn't a situation where there was the slightest bit of ambiguity. 17 and 73. Billionare's private island.
Defending that situation - real or hypothetical - is very problematic. It gets you fired. There might be a very narrow context in which a discussion of that nature would be appropriate. Where it happened was a million miles from there.
How is that a problem exactly?
> 17 and 73
Would her being a 18 prostitute change anything in your eyes? Because I am pretty sure that most 17 year olds can easily be confused with 18 year olds and the reverse.
> Defending that situation - real or hypothetical - is very problematic. It gets you fired.
In our current "cancel culture" society, agree.
An 18 year old prostitute is extraordinarily likely to be in that situation as a result of a lifetime of abuse and desperation. Taking advantage of that for sexual pleasure, especially at the age of 73, makes you a terrible person.
An old man taking advantage of a young woman is the issue. One year and tiny permutations of the details which change the legal situation do not change the moral situation that in any similar situation, the old man is a indefensible scumbag.
It doesn't matter if it is a hypothetical or not, defending that old man by saying the victim would have presented herself as willing, is a big issue. Not a witch hunt, not mob rule.
Of course not.
Then, where is the line? If not 18, then, 25? 30? I get why it would be creepy from the perspective of the woman wanting to be with an old man, but why exactly is the man himself a creep?
IMO, all adults are attracted to the younger opposite sex. Men have a biological drive to be attracted to women who will give birth to healthy babies, survive the birth, and live long enough lives to ensure that child is supported.
I'm 30 now. I hope people never regard me as a creep for masterbating when I'm 60 to the teen section of PornHub.
