Post Syndicated from Bradley M. Kuhn original http://ebb.org/bkuhn/blog/2019/10/15/fsf-rms.html

The last 33 days have been unprecedentedly difficult for the software
freedom community and for me personally. Folks have been emailing, phoning, texting, tagging me
on social media (— the last of which has been funny, because all my
social media accounts are placeholder accounts). But, just about
everyone has urged me to comment on the serious issues that the software freedom
community now faces. Until now, I have stayed silent regarding all
these current topics: from Richard M. Stallman (RMS)’s public statements, to his
resignation from the Free Software Foundation (FSF), to the Epstein scandal
and its connection to MIT. I’ve also avoided generally commenting on software freedom organizational governance during this period. I did this for good
reason, which is explained below. However, in this blog post, I now share
my primary comments on the matters that seem to currently be of the utmost
attention of the Open Source and Free Software communities.

I have been silent the last month because, until two days ago, I was an
at-large member
of FSF’s Board of
Directors, and a Voting Member of the FSF. As a member of FSF’s two
leadership bodies, I was abiding by a reasonable request from the FSF
management and my duty to the organization. Specifically, the FSF asked
that all communication during the
crisis come directly
from FSF officers and not from at-large directors and/or Voting Members.
Furthermore, the FSF management asked all Directors and Voting Members to
remain silent on this entire matter — even on issues only
tangentially related to the current situation, and even when speaking in
our own capacity (e.g., on our own blogs like this one). The FSF is an
important organization, and I take any request from the FSF seriously
— so I abided fully with their request.

The situation was further complicated because folks at my employer, Software
Freedom Conservancy (where I also serve on the Board of Directors) had
strong opinions about this matter as well. Fortunately, the FSF and
Conservancy both had already created clear protocols for what I should do
if ever there was a disagreement or divergence of views between Conservancy
and FSF. I therefore was recused fully from the planning, drafting, and
timing of Conservancy’s statement on this matter. I thank
my colleagues at the Conservancy for working so carefully to keep me entirely outside the loop on their statement and
to diligently assure that it was straight-forward for me to manage any
potential organizational disagreements. I also thank those at the FSF who
outlined clear protocols (ahead of time, back in March 2019) in case a
situation like this ever came up. I also know my colleagues at Conservancy
care deeply, as I do, about the health and welfare of the FSF and its
mission of fighting for universal software freedom for all. None of us
want, nor have, any substantive disagreement over software freedom issues.

I take very seriously my
duty to the various organizations where I have (or have had)
affiliations. More generally, I champion
non-profit organizational transparency. Unfortunately, the current crisis left me in a quandary between the overarching
goal of community transparency and abiding by FSF management’s directives. Now that
I’ve left the FSF Board of Directors, FSF’s Voting Membership, and all my
FSF volunteer roles (which ends my 22-year uninterrupted affiliation
with the FSF), I can now comment on the substantive issues that face
not just the FSF, but the Free Software community as a whole, while continuing to adhere to my past duty of
acting in FSF’s best interest. In other
words, my affiliation with the FSF has come to an end for many good and
useful reasons. The end to this affiliation allows me
to speak directly about the core issues at the heart of the community’s current crisis.

Firstly, all these events — from RMS’ public comments on the MIT
mailing list, to RMS’ resignation from the FSF to RMS’ discussions about the
next steps for the GNU project — seem to many to have happened
ridiculously quickly. But it wasn’t actually fast at all. In fact, these events were culmination of issues
that were slowly growing in concern to many people, including me.

For the last two years, I had been a loud internal voice in the FSF
leadership regarding RMS’ Free-Software-unrelated public statements; I felt
strongly that it was in the best interest of the FSF to actively seek to
limit such statements, and that it was my duty to FSF to speak out about this within the organization. Those who only learned of this story in the last
month (understandably)
believed Selam
G.’s Medium post raised an entirely new issue. In fact, RMS’ views and statements posted on stallman.org about sexual morality escalated for the worse over the last few years. When the escalation
started, I still considered RMS both a friend and colleague, and I
attempted to argue with him at length to convince him that some of his
positions were harmful to sexual assault survivors and those who are sex-trafficked, and to the people who devote their lives in service
to such individuals. More importantly to the FSF, I attempted to persuade
RMS that launching a controversial campaign on sexual behavior and morality
was counter to his and FSF’s mission to advance software freedom, and told
RMS that my duty as an FSF Director was to assure the best outcome for the
FSF, which IMO didn’t include having a leader who made such statements.
Not only is human sexual behavior not a topic on which RMS has adequate academic
expertise, but also his positions appear to ignore significant research and
widely available information on the subject. Many of his comments, while
occasionally politically intriguing, lack empathy for people who
experienced trauma.

IMO, this is not and has never been a Free Speech issue. I do believe freedom of
speech links directly to software freedom: indeed, I see the freedom to
publish software under Free licenses as almost a corollary to the freedom
of speech. However, we do not need to follow leadership from those whose
views we fundamentally disagree. Moreover, organizations need not and
should not elevate spokespeople and leaders who speak regularly on
unrelated issues that organizations find do not
advance their mission, and/or that alienate important constituents. I, like many other software freedom leaders, curtail my public comments on issues not related to
FOSS. (Indeed, I would
not even be commenting on this issue if it had not become a
central issue of concern to the software freedom community.) Leaders have power, and they must exercise the power of their
words with restraint, not with impunity.

RMS has consistently argued that there was a campaign of “prudish
intimidation” — seeking to keep him quiet about his views on
sexuality. After years of conversing with RMS about how his
non-software-freedom views were a distraction, an indulgence, and downright
problematic, his general response was to make even more public
comments of this nature. The issue is not about RMS’
right to say what he believes, nor is it even about whether or not you
agree or disagree with RMS’ statements. The question is whether an
organization should have a designated leader who is on a sustained, public
campaign advocating about an unrelated issue that many consider
controversial. It really doesn’t matter what your view about the
controversial issue is; a leader who refuses to stop talking loudly about
unrelated issues eventually creates an untenable distraction from the
radical activism you’re actively trying to advance. The message of
universal software freedom is a radical cause; it’s basically
impossible for one individual to effectively push forward two unrelated
controversial agendas at once. In short, the radical message of software
freedom became overshadowed by RMS’ radical views about sexual
morality.

And here is where I say the thing that may infuriate many but it’s what I believe: I think RMS took
a useful step by resigning some of his leadership roles at the FSF.
I thank RMS for taking that step, and I wish the
FSF Directors well in their efforts to assure that the
FSF becomes a welcoming organization to all who care about universal software freedom.
The FSF’s mission is essential to our
technological future, and we should all support that mission. I care deeply about that mission myself
and have worked and will continue to work in our community in the best interest of the mission.

I’m admittedly struggling to find a way to work again with
RMS, given his views on sexual morality and his behaviors stemming
from those views. I explicitly do not agree with this “(re-)definition” of sexual assault.
Furthermore, I believe uninformed statements about sexual assault are irresponsible
and cause harm to victims. #MeToo is not a “frenzy”; it is a global movement by
individuals who have been harmed seeking to hold both bad
actors and society-at-large accountable for ignoring systemic
wrongs. Nevertheless,
I still am proud of the essay that I co-wrote with RMS
and still find
many of RMS’ other essays compelling,
important, and relevant.

I want the FSF to succeed in its mission and enter a new era of accomplishments. I’ve spent the last 22 years, without a break,
dedicating substantial time, effort, care and loyalty to the various FSF roles that I’ve had: including
employee, volunteer, at-large Director, and Voting Member. Even though my
duties to the FSF are done, and my relationship with the FSF is no longer
formal, I still think the FSF is a valuable institution worth helping and saving,
specifically because the FSF was founded for a mission that I deeply
support. And we should also realize that RMS — a human being (who is
flawed like the rest of us) — invented that mission.

As culture change becomes more rapid, I hope we can find reasonable nuance
and moderation on our complex analysis about people and their disparate
views, while we also hold individuals fully accountable for their actions.
That’s the difficulty we face in the post-post-modern culture of the early
twenty-first century. Most importantly, I believe we must find a way to
stand firm for software freedom while also making a safe environment for
victims of sexual assault, sexual abuse, gaslighting, and other deplorable
actions.