As I've grown up, I've realized that "such assertive terms" tend to translate to "I have an unfettered view of the inside of my ass, and I'm positive what everything looks like in here".
Sure, but they do things like misapply the label "freedom to read" on an article that seems to mainly be about not getting the entertainment one might desire on the terms one might desire. I was hoping for something more rigorous than preaching to the choir.
I once read that those who are prideful (i.e. arrogant, conceited, pompous) are universally despised, because those who are humble recognize and abhor the ugliness of this vice, and those who are prideful can't stand the thought others thinking they're better than them.
but then why are many assertive, pompous people successful, but that I don't think that describes Stallman though. He seems pretty down to earth
Being successful does not imply not being despised. In fact, it often seems the two are positively correlated. Success is often shorthand for wealth and power, and there's a lot more to life than that.
No one is universally despised. I can prove it, because I despise no one.
That's not what I meant. Universally meaning, not on an individual basis, but categorical basis, of whether each person is humble or not. It's along the lines of the phrase "there's two types of people" where everyone belongs to either one group or another. Why is semantically correct communication so inherently difficult? Why was this comment of mine necessary? I once heard this is why Latin became the universal language: because it had much more nuance and complexity than other languages, which as it turned out was necessary when managing an empire that spanned the known world, so no other language would do.
You used a tremendous number of words to clarify your meaning but haven't changed my understanding of the word 'universally' at all.
In my dictionary, "universally" has two definitions: "by everyone" and "in every case". You're only using the first definition. I'm using the second one.