Richard Stallman Resigns from CSAIL and FSF | Hacker News Reader

Richard Stallman Resigns from CSAIL and FSF

forbes.com

38 pointsjes31 comments

This comment is about Forbes, and news reporting, not Richard Stallman, so no flames please.

Forbes twists the quote in the "topline" ("claimed [she] was 'entirely willing'"), then includes a more-complete quote two paragraphs later ("most likely 'presented herself to him as entirely willing'"). I don't know how an editor can see both of those things in their field of vision and think they're equivalent.

Again, ignoring the actual topic completely for the purposes of this comment, this is a good example to frame on your wall of how the "content industry" will squeeze any nuance out of a statement to generate clicks.

Forbes probably felt compelled to write an article about this but also didn't want to go against the narrative and be accused of sympthathizing with someone who is now widely believed to be a pedophile apologist.

The misquote actually alters the narrative from “pedophile apologist” to “child slanderer”, since he’s supposedly declaring his knowledge of the mental state of the child concerned. Which, amazingly, is an even worse narrative.

Even the more complete quote is out of context. The full context was:

> We can imagine many scenarios, but the most plausible scenario is that she presented herself to him as entirely willing. Assuming she was being coerced by Epstein, he would have had every reason to tell her to conceal that from most of his associates

I've sent a comment to their "corrections" address. Newsguard gives Forbes the highest possible score. If that rating is accurate, they'll update the story.

Existing discussion here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20990583

Any reason to duplicate the discussion?

Not on this basis. Forbes parrots much of the mischaracterizations.

Also

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20989696

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20994245

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20992381

To be fair, earlier submissions all got flagged off the front page fairly quickly, so later submitters may well not have known about them.

I find it surprising to the extreme that a person like Stallmann, supposedly smart and well versed in legal matters lacks the understanding of how the legal system works:

"Unintentional crime is still a crime."

Unwittiness in committing a crime is, at best, a mitigating circumstance, that does not justify or excuse the conduct.

The second issue is that does not matter what you and I (or Stallman) think. All that matters is what the law says - it is a crime when the law says so - we can't be going around redefining laws so that they don't apply when it does not suit us. The most one can hope for is to have a law redefined in a court of law (precedents, interpretations etc).

Some unintentional crimes are crimes, but many, maybe most require intent. This is called mens rea and it’s so important you’ll learn it in your high school introduction to the law course.

Actually what we learn (or should learn in high school) is that pleading ignorance: "I did not know this or that" is a terrible starting argument for many crimes.

This is what I was referring to in my observation. Stallman should know better than to argue ignorance.

Beyond that, the law is complex and generalizations (which I myself did) run the risk of oversimplifying realities.

I was specifically referring to this case, where Stallman argues that his friend was just misled. I believe that argument not just "tone deaf" but actually wrong.

We can imagine a number of scenarios, but the most plausible scenario is that RMS presented himself as entirely willing to step down.

His statement says he is stepping down due to misinterpretations and misunderstandings (AKA he stands by his statements), which IMO means he was given the ultimatum of "your job or your opinion" aka if he wanted to stay he would need to repudiate the things he said, and he likely chose to stand by his interpretation of the discussion and resign.

Read his recent emails and you'll understand my comment better.

Excellent comment! It exposes the perfidiousness of Stallman's argument.

Good article for me as someone who is entirely outside the news cycle about this.

Pretty insane that you loose your job just because you have the wrong opinions about something. I don't understand why not FSF and others simply stand behind him in events like these?

This is pretty ridiculous and I hate this PC-elite that is currently ruling tech. I don't care about your code of conduct or what your thoughts are about different words.

I just hope Stallman the best and that he should not back down to the kind of bullshit that's been thrown on him. That is simply letting them win.

Fuck everyone that has the "you said something that I do not like, now you must resign"-mentality.

Simplifying the issue this much to boil it down to "a difference in opinions" is a bit dishonest. It was a very specific opinion that crossed the line, it's not like he said he prefers chocolate to vanilla.

He demonstrated a complete lack of understanding of how the legal system works.

IMHO he is not qualified to lead FSF.

I think everyone is tired of these likely stories regarding Epstein, then RMS wanders in to defend a 70 year old pervert.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com