I’ve tried using my incredible (british) brain using Google to see if these open source titans ever engaged in a battle of “friendly conversation” with one another.
I was always interested what Stallman thought of the angry but smart finnish man who gave us the robust penguin kernel that breathes life into older machines and powers supercomputers for the weather.
The same with Torvalds thoughts on Stallmans GNU involvement and him as a person.
This is because you sometimes had different organisations in the FOSS and OSS community that take on different meanings so I wanted a better idea if these chaps ever spoke in an interview together.
TLDR : Does finnish man like bearded GNU jesus man and the same vice versa
I can’t remember having seen them debating each other, either in person or otherwise. But their positions are well known. Linus chose the GPL license from an engineering/pragmatic viewpoint, while Stallman is an idealist.
Apparently they are quite friendly:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bDxMJQLXmBE
Unfortunately he’s said a lot more than that.
Richard Stallman on paedophilia:
“The nominee is quoted as saying that if the choice of a sexual partner were protected by the Constitution, ‘prostitution, adultery, necrophilia, bestiality, possession of child pornography, and even incest and pedophilia’ also would be. He is probably mistaken, legally–but that is unfortunate. All of these acts should be legal as long as no one is coerced. They are illegal only because of prejudice and narrowmindedness.”
RMS on June 28th, 2003
"I think that everyone age 14 or above ought to take part in sex, though not indiscriminately. (Some people are ready earlier.)
RMS on May 25th 2003
“I am skeptical of the claim that voluntarily pedophilia harms children. The arguments that it causes harm seem to be based on cases which aren’t voluntary, which are then stretched by parents who are horrified by the idea that their little baby is maturing.”
RMS on June 5th, 2006
“There is little evidence to justify the widespread assumption that willing participation in pedophilia hurts children.”
RMS on Jan 4th, 2013
People need to understand that you can be a champion of FOSS, and have some great ideas in terms of software liberty, while also having some really shitty views in other areas.
It’s why people should avoid celebrity worship. Just because an engineer/sportsperson/actor/artist/CEO does something you like, doesn’t necessarily mean they’re a good person, or devoid of human flaws.
His view did evolve after being talked to later about it. On the grounds that power dynamics involved in age differences create a coercive effect of even someone who could be mature enough to logically and emotionally grasp the concepts.
He is also deeply in the libertarian mind set that illegal means enforced with guns and batons and restrictions of rights, and that puts a higher bar to what should be legal.
Though I do totally agree with you on hero worship. Nobody is perfect and that impossibility is expontetially more true if want them to have been, to be and continue to be perfect forever.
And what’s your point with posting this? My guess is that you don’t even understand it.
He is saying there is no such thing as willing participation from a child in pedophilia. Are you saying there is?
Unfortunately, that is not the case. Stallman is absolutely a defender of having sex with children.
Richard Stallman on paedophilia:
“The nominee is quoted as saying that if the choice of a sexual partner were protected by the Constitution, ‘prostitution, adultery, necrophilia, bestiality, possession of child pornography, and even incest and pedophilia’ also would be. He is probably mistaken, legally–but that is unfortunate. All of these acts should be legal as long as no one is coerced. They are illegal only because of prejudice and narrowmindedness.”
RMS on June 28th, 2003
"I think that everyone age 14 or above ought to take part in sex, though not indiscriminately. (Some people are ready earlier.)
RMS on 25th May, 2003
To be fair for that one, he doesn’t specify whether 14 or under is fine for an adult to have sex with. It’s certainly possible to interpret this as child-child relations only, but given his other comments where he says adult-child sex is fine, I decided to include this one.
“I am skeptical of the claim that voluntarily pedophilia harms children. The arguments that it causes harm seem to be based on cases which aren’t voluntary, which are then stretched by parents who are horrified by the idea that their little baby is maturing.”
RMS on June 5th, 2006
“There is little evidence to justify the widespread assumption that willing participation in pedophilia hurts children.”
RMS on Jan 4th, 2013
I understand that Stallman has excellent views on liberty in software, and he’s made enormous contributions to FOSS. But that does not necessarily mean he’s a good person or that all of his views are good ones. People are flawed. IMO his views on the morality of having sex with children aren’t good ones, but I recognise that I agree with him in other ways.
I think the phrasing isn’t the best. I think he needs an “is what” before “hurts children” in the first paragraph.
