"If the people who came before me--those who taught me the game of avoiding rms--had spoken up, the community could have healed before I even came on the scene. If I and others had stood up fifteen years ago, we'd have another couple generations who were more used to respect, inclusion, welcoming and safety. The FSF board could have done their job back in 2018. And perhaps if more of us had spoken out in 2019, the FSF board would have found the strength to stand strong and not accept rms's return."
Like all other tell-alls that have emerged, there is nothing of substance in that article that would condemn Stallman. The only actual offense is interrupting people on stage.
Hitting on someone by talking about emacs would be funny if it weren't for the insinuation of some sort of sexual assault that was attached to it in the article. Speechifying when talking with someone about codes of conduct is at most boorish.
It may well be a burden to have someone butt into your work and lecture you on ethics, but to conflate social discomfort with a loss of personal safety is self-serving and dishonest.
One uncharitable way to view this saga is that the people who failed to effectively argue with Stallman on his moral points have resorted to slander by misrepresenting disregard for superficial social convention as malice.
"Perhaps you discount the benefits of white male privilege. You’re wrong. Of course I cannot speak from experience, but being female in a misogynistic environment is /exhausting/. Being non-white in a racist society is /exhausting/. You may think the current pre-release crunch is tiring – but it has an end and will stop. The adverse affects of white male privilege never stop."
"Our intent is to be welcoming, but RMS’s toxicity is repellent. We might not desire that toxicity reflect upon us, but it does. Our intent may be good, but intent is not important – impact is, and /harm is being done/. Fix it."
“RMS is no longer a developer of GCC, the most recent commit I can find regards
SCO in 2003. Prior to that there were commits in 1997, but significantly less
than 1994 and earlier. GCC’s implementation language is now C++, which I
believe RMS neither uses nor likes. When was RMS’ most recent positive input to
the GCC project? Even if it was recent and significant, that doesn’t mean his
toxic behavior should be accepted.“
https://hartmans.livejournal.com/100652.html