On Mon, Sep 23, 2019, 10:28 PM Thomas Lord <[1]lord@basiscraft.com> wrote: > Thank you for raising this. The recent (admittedly misreported) gaff When people launch a press campaign to lie about you and defame you on the basis of a libel, that is not your "gaff". The "gaff" is jumping into the Epstein conversation without understanding the context at all. The entire MIT community had been discussing the way women are treated as second class citizens because men of like Epstein -- for weeks. Women have been sharing stories of important networking parties that they weren't invited to because only underage girls were invited. They've been talking about who gets invited to what meetings and who gets promoted at MIT and how that drives the focus of the work the. Jumping in to say, "Maybe one of those men who slept with an underage girl didn't know she was being trafficked" was an extreme case of not reading the room. So yeah, that's a "gaff." It also brought to the center of the conversation, many of the other times that women have been belittled, written off or subjected to harassment here in free software. The article in Vice was badly done. But every article in Vice is badly done. That isn't a conspiracy, it's just crappy journalism from an outlet well-known for crappy journalism. The outrage (and demand for new leadership) is coming from real women who have tried to participate in free software and been rebuffed by sexist behavior who felt that perhaps at this moment they might *finally* be heard. I offer this perspective in the spirit of helping the free software community move forward. If we get stuck on the Vice article (seriously, no one trusts Vice) without addressing any of the legitimate issues, then we won't be able to move forward. Best, Deb No reasonable person could have published any of the widely read attacks. They are intellectually and socially dishonest, objectively, and to the core. -t On 2019-09-23 19:09, Deb Nicholson wrote: On Mon, Sep 23, 2019 at 8:36 PM A. Mani <[1][2]a.mani.cms@gmail.com> wrote: On Tue, Sep 24, 2019 at 5:36 AM Aaron Wolf <[2][3]wolftune@riseup.net> wrote: > > On 2019-09-23 4:39 p.m., A. Mani wrote: > > > > The misinterpretation part is hardly the problem. The bigger problem > > is the number of reports on > > RMS's misogyny, anti-feminist position and doings that have > > accumulated over time. These were not so well-known before even within > > the free software community before -- at most people invoked various > > disorders to explain RMS's behavior. In one keynote, RMS's response to > > a question was > > "Oh wait you're a woman! I don't answer questions from women." > > Furthermore there are ill-informed statements on feminism in RMS's > > blog -- they mean RMS is still a slave of the patriarchy. > > > > Apologies for language pickiness, but I think what you're describing is > more like sexism than misogyny. RMS is a product of a particularly > male-dominated sexist tech culture within an overall sexist society. > Combine that with social awkwardness, and that's a pretty parsimonious > explanation for RMS' behavior. > OK Yes, and a freedom movement -- a movement that seeks to empower people -- ought to be held to a higher standard. What is the point of building a better world that carefully maintains all of the sexism of mainstream (proprietary) software communities? The FSF is incorporated as a charity with a mission that definitely does not include "upholding or exceeding mainstream tech's sexism." > The claim that he holds overall anti-feminist positions seems inaccurate > to me from all I've seen of his stated views. > Sexism leads to dismissal of feminist viewpoints +1 > That question response quote is so extreme, the most reasonable > assumption is that it was said as a facetious joke. I have never > encountered that anecdote before, so I have no context. But taking it at > pure face value makes no sense to me whatsoever. That talk was terribly bad: [3][4]https://twitter.com/sh4na/status/1174034117077413889 "Oh he was called out on it, for decades. There are many blog posts and mailing list threads calling him out on this particular incident and all the others. He never gave a shit about any of it, neither did his followers or the @fsf or the orgs inviting him to speak." Strangely this was not stated on Linuxchix website and elsewhere. Thank you for raising this. The recent (admittedly misreported) gaff merely brought to light what has been happening within the free software movement for years. We can't reasonably expect people to believe we are building a better, freer world without a strong commitment to an inclusive movement and that means we can't keep enabling and encouraging sexist behavior. Best, Deb Best A Mani Prof.Dr.(Miss) A Mani CU, ASL, AMS, ISRS, CLC, CMS, IEEE Senior Member, International Rough Set Society Homepage: [4][5]http://www.logicamani.in Blog: [5][6]https://logicamani.blogspot.in/ Research Gate: [6][7]https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Mani_A [7]sip:[8]girlprofessor@ekiga.net _______________________________________________ libreplanet-discuss mailing list [8][9]libreplanet-discuss@libreplanet.org [9][10]https://lists.libreplanet.org/mailman/listinfo/libreplanet- discus s References 1. mailto:[11]a.mani.cms@gmail.com 2. mailto:[12]wolftune@riseup.net 3. [13]https://twitter.com/sh4na/status/1174034117077413889 4. [14]http://www.logicamani.in/ 5. [15]https://logicamani.blogspot.in/ 6. [16]https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Mani_A 7. mailto:[17]sip:[18]girlprofessor@ekiga.net 8. mailto:[19]libreplanet-discuss@libreplanet.org 9. [20]https://lists.libreplanet.org/mailman/listinfo/libreplanet-discuss _______________________________________________ libreplanet-discuss mailing list [21]libreplanet-discuss@libreplanet.org [22]https://lists.libreplanet.org/mailman/listinfo/libreplanet-discuss References 1. mailto:lord@basiscraft.com 2. mailto:a.mani.cms@gmail.com 3. mailto:wolftune@riseup.net 4. https://twitter.com/sh4na/status/1174034117077413889 5. http://www.logicamani.in/ 6. https://logicamani.blogspot.in/ 7. https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Mani_A 8. mailto:girlprofessor@ekiga.net 9. mailto:libreplanet-discuss@libreplanet.org 10. https://lists.libreplanet.org/mailman/listinfo/libreplanet-discus 11. mailto:a.mani.cms@gmail.com 12. mailto:wolftune@riseup.net 13. https://twitter.com/sh4na/status/1174034117077413889 14. http://www.logicamani.in/ 15. https://logicamani.blogspot.in/ 16. https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Mani_A 17. mailto:sip 18. mailto:girlprofessor@ekiga.net 19. mailto:libreplanet-discuss@libreplanet.org 20. https://lists.libreplanet.org/mailman/listinfo/libreplanet-discuss 21. mailto:libreplanet-discuss@libreplanet.org 22. https://lists.libreplanet.org/mailman/listinfo/libreplanet-discuss