[raclage]

> I don't much care if people around me feel...make me feel comfortable

This doesn't seem consistent with the commonly accepted meaning of "comfortable." By their very nature things that make someone uncomfortable are things they care about. If they truly didn't care they would not experience discomfort.

Are there really cultures where inflicting suffering on others is not "within their cultural frame and value system"?

[blagie]

> Are there really cultures where inflicting suffering on others is not "within their cultural frame and value system"?

Yes!

* Consider treatment of children in Korea, where kids are forced, by their parents, to study 16 hours per day.

* Consider tactics used in many resistance movements against oppressive governments in Slavic cultures (and similar tactics recently adopted by oppressed African American communities in the US), which are explicitly about making people feel uncomfortable about wrongs.

* Consider Spartan culture (or any other macho culture). Even in the US, why would Marines do the things they do?

* Consider historical Catholic culture of denial and self-sacrifice.

* Consider "drink from the firehose" culture at elite tech schools like MIT.

* Heck, consider the way many cultures temper kids to be resiliant to discomfort (e.g. dipping in cold water in parts of Eastern Europe)

... and so on. Contemporary progressive Western culture is almost uniquely focused on concepts like fun and personal comfort.

The way your comment conflates "comfort" with "things they care about" is an example of that.

Broadly speaking, Western culture is also (both currently and historically) more focused than most other cultures on surface politeness. "If you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all" is an middle/upper-class WASP concept. In China, if you're fat, you'll get called fat. That's not uniquely US (Japan is even further in that direction), but it is a place a lot of people have to code switch in the US, since the US (with a few other countries, like England, Germany, and Japan) are outliers there. I can't raise my voice in a professional middle-class US workplace. I can do a lot of things on international conference calls (to the relief of both sides!) which would get me instantly fired in the US.

It's a signalling and oppression mechanism too; if a construction worker learned to code but didn't learn to code switch US cultures too, they'd likely never achieve socioeconomic mobility. Google would say they're an aggressive, sexist, white male (or if not white, at the very least, not a "culture fit"). It's how I let you know I'm part of your in-crowd.

Fortunately, I can code switch now!

> By their very nature things that make someone uncomfortable are things they care about. If they truly didn't care they would not experience discomfort.

You're conflating two different things (which are deeply conflated in US culture, so this isn't a comment about you). I'll give a couple of examples:

* I care about personal growth. Personal growth requires discomfort. Whether that's grinding through a complex math text, learning to code switch through immersion in a different culture, being told I'm wrong, or otherwise.

* My girlfriend has a mental health issue. She cares about resolving it. US culture has conditioned her to "manage" it by seeking ways which avoid "triggering" situations. As far as I can tell, that's leading to a spiral where it's getting worse. In my culture, you'd do the opposite; you'd seek out those situations to habituate to them (which is exceptionally uncomfortable).

[raclage]

I think you've confused cultures where people have a relatively high tolerance for discomfort because they consider it to be worth it (the examples you gave) and culture where people simply do not care about others' discomfort (how Stallman's colleagues describe him).

All those cultures have a goal in mind when inflicting discomfort. Does Stallman?

[blagie]

No, I haven't. I think you deeply don't understand those cultures. Cultures usually agree on what's bad, but not on how bad it is. In my school, everyone told "yo momma" jokes. I've also been in countries where insulting your mom would lead to a fist fight, and I'd be considered in the wrong for making the joke (and not the other person for punching me). How bad is a fist fight? How bad is a "yo momma" joke? It depends on your culture.

Yes, making someone feel uncomfortable is considered bad everywhere, but in many parts of the world, it's the same kind of bad as using the wrong fork to eat your salad in the US. No one cares. No one will argue it's not better than using the Right Fork, but whatever. (And yes, there are cultures where eating etiquette and ritual is super-important).

That's even true in parts of lower-class US culture. If I'm on a construction site, and there are two workers:

- One is impeccably polite, and never makes me uncomfortable

- One always helps me out in a bind; if I need a shift covered, or my family has an emergency, but goes out of their way to tease everyone

Guess who'll be preferred? It's the opposite from elite British society (which the US descends from), where I can conquer your country and exploit your people so long as I'm polite and don't lose my temper.

And yes, different types teasing and other ways of making people intentionally feel uncomfortable for NO reason are parts of many cultures, and no one cares.

As a footnote: As far as I know, Stallman does have a goal in inflicting discomfort: he is advocating for a particular set of social changes. Is that an effective way to do it? Probably not. But no one's perfect. Stallman works from first principles and kind of ignores prevailing culture.