Richard Stallman and the GNU project

Posted Oct 9, 2019 14:02 UTC (Wed) by tao (subscriber, #17563)
In reply to: Richard Stallman and the GNU project by LtWorf
Parent article: Richard Stallman and the GNU project

I've made inappropriate jokes and unwelcome advances. But when told they were inappropriate I took a hint. It affected my future actions. That is what's lacking in this case. Making mistakes *can* be acceptable if you learn from them instead of repeating them over and over.

Richard Stallman and the GNU project

Posted Oct 9, 2019 16:13 UTC (Wed) by LtWorf (subscriber, #124958) [Link] (3 responses)

But what is completely unacceptable for one person could be a very welcome advance to someone else.

I agree that persisting on the same person is certainly unwanted behaviour, but surely you don't expect someone to never make any jokes or advances ever because they upset one person.

And I haven't seen reports indicating that the same person was harassed more than once.

Richard Stallman and the GNU project

Posted Oct 9, 2019 16:18 UTC (Wed) by farnz (subscriber, #17727) [Link] (2 responses)

There's still a pattern - if the majority of people reject your advances, then at some point, you have to accept that what you're doing is unwanted to most people, and find a better way to target your advances.

Similar applies if you tell your racist joke to lots of different people, and they're all uncomfortable - the fact that each person only hears it once from you does not mean that you are faultless, rather it means that you're failing to learn from the failures.

Richard Stallman and the GNU project

Posted Oct 9, 2019 17:13 UTC (Wed) by LtWorf (subscriber, #124958) [Link] (1 responses)

> There's still a pattern - if the majority of people reject your advances, then at some point, you have to accept that what you're doing is unwanted to most people

I agree. Any indications that this was not the case for rms?

And even then, not everyone is skilled on social cues, so it might take a while before they independently figure it out.

If they are calmly explained what they did wrong it is another situation.

Richard Stallman and the GNU project

Posted Oct 9, 2019 20:16 UTC (Wed) by karkhaz (subscriber, #99844) [Link]

> If they are calmly explained what they did wrong it is another situation.

mjg59 and dkg both stated that they have already done so on several occasions in a different thread: https://lwn.net/Articles/800042/

Richard Stallman and the GNU project

Posted Oct 11, 2019 10:55 UTC (Fri) by zenaan (guest, #3778) [Link] (1 responses)

> I've made inappropriate jokes and unwelcome advances. But when told they were inappropriate I took a hint. It affected my future actions. That is what's lacking in this [RMS] case.

Let me repeat the relevant part of the quote:

"That is what's lacking in this case."

Over and over, and over, again, allegations and innuendo are made, assumed, propagated, in this massive and public discussion re RMS.

Facts, people, facts are what you need if you want to shift the world and if you want anything resembling due process and not a mob rule witch hunt!

Richard Stallman and the GNU project

Posted Oct 13, 2019 23:54 UTC (Sun) by flussence (guest, #85566) [Link]

The relevant part of the quote is the entire quote.

Between you quoting it and you selecting a soundbite from it to push your agenda (two lines), you seem to have forgotten the rest of what it said. Go back and read it again, until you understand.