October 14th, 2024 Richard Stallman (aka “RMS”) is the founder of GNU and the Free Software Foundation and present-day voting member of the Free Software Foundation (FSF) board of directors and “Chief GNUisance” of the GNU project. He is responsible for innumerable contributions to the free software movement, setting its guiding principles, organizing political action, and directly contributing to a flourishing free software ecosystem. The majority of Stallman’s political activity has been of priceless value to society at large.
  •  alyaza [they/she]   ( @alyaza@beehaw.org ) 
    12•6 hours ago

    An anonymous hit job

    it’s literally his own words all the way down here. if it’s a “hit job” it’s entirely Stallman’s own fault for being a freak with morally abhorrent takes. one of the first things mentioned here is that he had to retract the position that “voluntarily pedophilia” doesn’t harm children (a category of person he defines as anyone under about 13)! any reasonable person would find this abhorrent and Stallman a horrible person for ever having defended said position in the first place, because it is genuinely abhorrent to defend something like that. that’s just child abuse.

      •  alyaza [they/she]   ( @alyaza@beehaw.org ) A
        8•6 hours ago

        Not defending pedophiles, but

        you are about to defend pedophilia. rethink this and stop talking.

        there was a time when 13 was considered adult.

        and? Stallman is not talking about a previous time at any point here. also: that previous time was bad anyways. why would we want to–especially with respect to age of consent–go back to considering 13-year olds and younger to be adults? they cannot meaningfully consent to sexual relations with adults; it’s just child abuse. all of this is why Stallman’s words are abhorrent.

        It’s still legal for teenagers to marry in most countries.

        Stallman is not talking about teenagers. he explicitly distinguishes children (again, people <13 for him) from teenagers (people 13-17).

      •  Whom   ( @Whom@beehaw.org ) English
        4•6 hours ago

        You’re free to look at the context that they frequently link to, it doesn’t help. His political notes that contain the majority of his public musings are typically very brief and the quotes used typically replicate the entirety of the original text or cut off changes of subject.

        Stallman is very clear in his beliefs.

      •  alyaza [they/she]   ( @alyaza@beehaw.org ) 
        4•5 hours ago

        i mean, whom among us has not said such things, without retraction, as:

        Cody Wilson [who at the time of his charging was 30] has been charged with “sexual assault” on a “child” after a session with a sex worker of age 16. […] The article refers to the sex worker as a “child”, but that is not so. Elsewhere it has been published that she is 16 years old. That is late adolescence, not childhood. Calling teenagers “children” encourages treating teenagers as children, a harmful practice which retards their development into capable adults.

        Mere possession of child pornography should not be a crime at all. To prosecute people for possessing something published, no matter what it may be, is a big threat to human rights.

        A national campaign seeks to make all US states prohibit sex between humans and nonhuman animals. This campaign seems to be sheer bull-headed prudery, using the perverse assumption that sex between a human and an animal hurts the animal. That’s true for some ways of having sex, and false for others. For instance, I’ve heard that some women get dogs to lick them off. That doesn’t hurt the dog at all. Why should it be prohibited?

        and whom among us has not had to retract such positions as:

        There is little evidence to justify the widespread assumption that willing participation in pedophilia hurts children.

        these are obviously positions that everyone would take the fall for if they had a blog.