
Richard Stallman’s Disgrace - jmsflknr
https://daringfireball.net/2019/09/richard_stallmans_disgrace
======
bsaul
I’m sorry but people seem to forget what the archetypal geek looked like in
the 80s. Fat, smelly, eating burgers in front of his computer all day, awkward
and drooling at the sight of any woman.

From what gruber is writing, it looks like RMS just happened to be talented
enough that people actually let him behave like this and still talk to him and
let him have a social life (as opposed to the other ones that simply didn’t
leave their room or their desk).

Let’s not make every people from that era criminals or jobless. Just let time
do its work and just wait until they retire.

~~~
soganess
That's not true, it some BS cultural narrative with a couple data points that
allows people to other that which they fear to be a part of. It's the tech
equivalent to artist are tortured geniuses.

More importantly, I would much rather have no power "geeks" pushing toxic
sex/race/gender politics out of fear and awkwardness then the structural crap
being pushed on mass by big tech companies with huge gold parachutes for bad
actors.

I grew up loving the ideas of RMS, but for every RMS behaving "nerd", there
were 4 Ivan Sutherland, Grace Hooper, Alan Kay, Ajay Bhatt.

~~~
bsaul
Well, no. There's definitely some kind of truth behind it. Wanting to spend
most of your life in front of a computer , barely talking to anyone was
considered something very weird until it became common in all kinds of jobs.

I remember when i started freelancing 10 years ago, people would say things
like "oh, you don't look like a developer. i mean, we can talk to you
normally". And that was based on their personal experience with their own IT
department.

And i know teachers in coding schools that regularly have to make public
announcement asking people to take showers every morning. I couldn't believe
it when they told me that, but apparently they had to.

~~~
soganess
I'm sure one could place those first two sentences at the start of any defense
of a stereotype.

    
    
      I remember when i started freelancing 10 years ago, people would say things like "oh, you don't look like a developer. i mean, we can talk to you normally".
    

I know so many tech workers with that exact story open. Telling individual
they are the special exception is how we maintain stereotypes. "My
preconceptions aren't wrong, this is just atypical" is the first rule in the
book.

And people's interactions with their IT departments are always so strange.
People don't like being at fault for productivity lose so they shift blame.
I've seen people blame the computer or even the IT guy for issues they do not
understand and balk at the explanation as "not normal." Those same people
wouldn't accuse a doctor of not speaking normal for using medical jargon. But
the stakes and the power dynamics are quite different in medicine.

While I care about my hygiene a fair bit, if I was in a coding academy and
someone had the audacity to treat a group adults like children and basically
tell them they don't understand how to keep their bodies clean... I would
demand a refund and tell that individual off for the self-serving
infantilization of others. There are a million reasons why someone's odor is
more noticeable then what most are accustom too. Simply assuming "nerds don't
shower, so I'll give em a little hand" is all kinds of wrong.

They can't shower but they can build infrastructure, right?

~~~
bsaul
Stereotypes don’t come from nowhere.. in the case of nerds, i don’t know of
any sociology studies performed by researchers on a nationwide scale, so i
guess personal experiences is all i can provide. They do mostly confirm the
sterotypes.

~~~
emiliobumachar
Beware of No True Scotsman. Of the people you know personally, who do you
consider a nerd, other than those who confirm the stereotype?

------
ratsmack
This highlights the 'the emperor has no clothes' syndrome where people will
just ignore the bad behavior of a person because of their position or stature.
Many times people will comment in confidence to close friends, because of the
fear they will be vilified with a public response of the issue.

It seems to me that this is more modern day anomaly driven by too much
hypersensitivity in our social interaction where we self censor to avoid the
most minor appearance of being critical or aggressive.

------
fargle
Is this the case that decades of bad behavior "caught up" with the "clueless
geek". Or SJWs picked the time and place to execute him?

~~~
krapp
It's the case that the clueless geek's bad behavior in this instance happened
to intersect with the Epstein affair via Marvin Minsky.

I know people like to imagine "SJWs" have arbitrary power to ruin mens' lives
on a whim, but no... there was already plenty of smoking kindling around RMS
when he decided to light the match on himself.

~~~
fargle
The linked article is a rehash of RMS's bad and gross habits, 3rd party
anecdotes about "creepiness". No meat. No sin. If RMS had been a level-2
dipshit, he'd been counseled by HR and not even fired.

What I see is, yes agreed timing perfect (Epstein/Minsky), to slander, destroy
that which is different, "gross"/"weird", etc.

When did it become OK to beat up on the Aspy kids? Oh, right SJW makes it
OK...

~~~
krapp
I don't know what "no meat, no sin" is supposed to mean, but most people with
RMS' history of creepy and harassing behavior would have been fired long ago.
Hell, the bad hygiene _alone_ would get most people fired.

~~~
fargle
It means thank goodness you aren't the HR director. You don't go around
harassing people because of hygiene. You don't fire people because of _3rd
hand_ reports of creepiness. You don't slander someones reputation just
because you _read_ somewhere about things that purportedly made him look
really bad.

It simply isn't true; thankfully labor law doesn't make a crime out of bad
smelling-ness and unsubstantiated creepiness.

------
neonate
What a mean and nasty article, irrespective of Stallman.

~~~
bigiain
Seriously? That's your takeaway here?

