It's a hard question to answer because really it depends on what you consider relevant computing in my opinion as well as how you interpret the post I was replying to. Despite the profit dominance of Apple for example, Android smartphones are the computer of the common man worldwide and so by extension the common man is coming into less and less contact with GNU. From that perspective it's hard to say that GNU will be part of what helps "avoid the seemingly inevitable slide into a techno-totalitarian future" as the original poster put it.
I'm not really sure I see what you're driving at. I mean yes, GNU's never been thaaat relevant to most people. That doesn't change that in the context of the OPs original point it's hard to see GNU as having done anything but lost ground in contemporary times. Which in turn makes it hard to see a way it'd be a path towards whatever salvation was being opined on. If the primary vehicle for GNU's propagation before was situations that saw it bundled with Linux we're now in a time where there's countless mainstream Linux devices and virtually none of them incorporate GNU.
Since we're at the limit of what the comment chain permits, I'm not really sure I see what you're driving at in your followup reply to me. I mean yes, GNU's never been thaaat relevant to most people. That doesn't change that in the context of the OPs original point it's hard to see GNU as having done anything but lost ground in contemporary times. Which in turn makes it hard to see a way it'd be a path towards whatever salvation was being opined on.