Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[mfriley]

For the record, I am not a GNU contributor--I am only chiming in as a

FOSS sympathizer. I will not pretend to be unbiased, or to have any sort

of personal experience with, or extensive knowledge of, RMS's behavior

apropos of GCC, or any other GNU project.

> (For the last point, I don't think the free software movement needs a
> single leader; it needs many people advocating free software, and
> discussing issues related to free software, from diverse perspectives.
> RMS's ideas that form the foundation of the free software movement are
> still of fundamental importance today.  But other people can now build
> better on those ideas in today's context.)

Perhaps it does not need a *formal* leader, but I am strongly inclined

to believe that guidance in some form or another does matter, and I think

a lot of RMS's supporters (vocal or otherwise) feel similarly. Some have

claimed that RMS has only repelled people from free software, and yet,

in spite of the threat of cancellation, many more people have signed the

letter in support of RMS than the one demanding his removal.

"Leaderless" movements are always feckless because they lack direction.

They start with good intentions, but when anyone can find a soapbox and

claim to speak for everyone else, those good intentions are inevitably

thrown under the bus by people seeking personal clout and pursuing their

own agendas.

Say what you will about RMS, but his unwavering laser focus on free

software advocacy shows a level of integrity that is hard not to respect.

This matters more than ever, because as difficult as it is to address

without sounding like a bitter right-wing hack, cancel culture is real,

and it will come for absolutely *anyone*, regardless of your personal

views. I doubt the majority of people signing the Github open letter

have judged the case against him for themselves, or even care one way

or another: people cancel because they can. Social media causes brain

damage, and this is how that brain damage tends to manifest.

There are people developing scripts and browser extensions to

automatically label or block anyone who signed the open letter in

defense of RMS. Just a few examples:

https://github.com/travisbrown/octocrabby
https://github.com/aaronbassett/rm
s-letter-sigs
https://github.com/sticks-stuff/highlight-RMS-supporters

There are also reports of people whose emails are visible on Github

receiving anonymous demands to remove their signatures from the

support letter, on threat of being reported to their employers.

People like this cannot be reasoned with, nor do they want to listen.

If given the chance, they will style themselves as representative of

FOSS, despite clear evidence that this is not the case. They thrive

on interpersonal conflict, so their input is virtually useless in

addressing any genuine issues plaguing GNU or the FOSS community as

a whole.

This is not directed at any reasoned criticism of RMS. I doubt that

everyone who wants him removed is so bluntly insane. If GNU and the

FSF see it fit, that is entirely their prerogative. But it will do

absolutely nothing to satisfy these people, because they are acting

in bad faith. As others have suggested, I fear that it will only make

things worse.

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Jonathan Wakely]

On Tue, 30 Mar 2021, 08:48 mfriley via Gcc, <gcc@gcc.gnu.org> wrote:

> For the record, I am not a GNU contributor--I am only chiming in as a
>
> FOSS sympathizer. I will not pretend to be unbiased, or to have any sort
>
> of personal experience with, or extensive knowledge of, RMS's behavior
>
> apropos of GCC, or any other GNU project.
>
> > (For the last point, I don't think the free software movement needs a
> > single leader; it needs many people advocating free software, and
> > discussing issues related to free software, from diverse perspectives.
> > RMS's ideas that form the foundation of the free software movement are
> > still of fundamental importance today.  But other people can now build
> > better on those ideas in today's context.)
>
> Perhaps it does not need a *formal* leader, but I am strongly inclined
>
> to believe that guidance in some form or another does matter, and I think
>
> a lot of RMS's supporters (vocal or otherwise) feel similarly. Some have
>
> claimed that RMS has only repelled people from free software, and yet,
>
> in spite of the threat of cancellation, many more people have signed the
>
> letter in support of RMS than the one demanding his removal.
>

We're talking here about whether he should be on the GCC steering
committee, not the FSF board. The GCC community should decide, not
signatories to petitions.



> "Leaderless" movements are always feckless because they lack direction.
>

We're not talking about a movement, were talking about the GCC project. We
have leaders, and a steering committee. RMS does not contribute usefully to
that steering committee.



> They start with good intentions, but when anyone can find a soapbox and
>
> [...]
>

This is not directed at any reasoned criticism of RMS. I doubt that
>
> everyone who wants him removed is so bluntly insane. If GNU and the
>
> FSF see it fit, that is entirely their prerogative. But it will do
>
> absolutely nothing to satisfy these people, because they are acting
>
> in bad faith. As others have suggested, I fear that it will only make
>
> things worse.


Totally irrelevant to his position on the GCC steering committee. If you
want to discuss the broader issues, please do so elsewhere.

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Ian Lance Taylor]

On Tue, Apr 6, 2021 at 3:28 AM Richard Biener
<richard.guenther@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Seeing the word "dysfunction" I don't remember using I want to clarify
> the non-openess which I intended to criticize.  The SC is not "open" because:
> - it appoints itself (new members, that is) - in fact in theory it
> should be appointed
>   by the FSF because the SC is the GNU maintainer of GCC
> - all requests and discussions are _private_ - the SC does not report to the
>   GCC project (it might report to the FSF which it is formally a delegate of)
> - you can reach the SC only indirectly (unless you know the secret mailing list
>   it operates on) - CC an SC member and hope a request is forwarded
>
> now I understand the SC sees itself as buffer between GCC and the FSF (RMS
> in particular) and it thinks we need to be protected from direct engagement.  I
> think this is wrong.  I can very well say NO to RMS myself.
>
> I'm actually curious how many of the 13 SC members actively contribute or
> whether the "SC show" is a one or two persons game and the "13" is just
> to make the SC appear as a big representative group of people.
>
> Thus I request an archive of the SC mailing list be made publically available
> and the SC discussion from now on take place in an open forum (you can
> choose to moderate everybody so the discussion while carried out in open
> is still amongst SC members only).

To a first approximation, the only thing that the SC does is approve
maintainers.  Questions like Nathan's example of libcody are rare.  To
be pedantically clear, by "maintainers" I mean the people listed in
the MAINTAINERS file who have the right to approve and commit changes
to various parts of the compiler.

While most discussion about approving maintainers is pro forma, there
are sometimes discussions as to whether a particular person has the
appropriate knowledge and sense of responsibility for the role.  I
don't think it would be appropriate to require that those discussions
be held publically.  In any case it wouldn't work; if they were
required to be public, SC members would resort to private e-mail for
anything they didn't want to be public.

So perhaps one thing we should be talking about is: can we develop a
mechanism for approving maintainers that does not involve the SC?

For example, I am also involved with the Go language project.  In that
project, any existing maintainer (that is, any person with the right
to commit changes to the repo) can approve any person to be a new
maintainer.  However, all changes require approval from at least two
maintainers, and, of course there are people who take at least a quick
look at every commit after it happens.  The two maintainer rule is
enforced by tooling, as all changes to Go must be made through Gerrit
(https://www.gerritcodereview.com/).  I'm not suggesting that we adopt
this for GCC, just mentioning as an example of a different approach
that does not require anything like the SC.

I'm sure other people on this list can give examples of other
approaches used by other free software projects.

Ian

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Siddhesh Poyarekar]

On 4/6/21 3:57 PM, Richard Biener via Gcc wrote:
> Seeing the word "dysfunction" I don't remember using I want to clarify
> the non-openess which I intended to criticize.  The SC is not "open" because:
> - it appoints itself (new members, that is) - in fact in theory it
> should be appointed
>    by the FSF because the SC is the GNU maintainer of GCC
> - all requests and discussions are _private_ - the SC does not report to the
>    GCC project (it might report to the FSF which it is formally a delegate of)
> - you can reach the SC only indirectly (unless you know the secret mailing list
>    it operates on) - CC an SC member and hope a request is forwarded
> 
> now I understand the SC sees itself as buffer between GCC and the FSF (RMS
> in particular) and it thinks we need to be protected from direct engagement.  I
> think this is wrong.  I can very well say NO to RMS myself.

FWIW, the glibc FSF stewards are analogous to the SC and pretty much all 
of those points apply to them.  My impression is that it's a symptom of 
governance style of GNU projects (or maybe GNU *toolchain* projects due 
to shared history) and not specifically anything to do with the steering 
committee or the glibc FSF stewards.  Perhaps (and I guess it's more 
hope than knowledge) dissociation from GNU/FSF will make it easier to 
change the nature of the SC/steward governance.

Siddhesh

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Matthias Klose]

On 4/6/21 12:27 PM, Richard Biener via Gcc wrote:
> On Thu, Apr 1, 2021 at 9:21 PM Ian Lance Taylor via Gcc <gcc@gcc.gnu.org> wrote:
>>
>> On Thu, Apr 1, 2021 at 10:08 AM Nathan Sidwell <nathan@acm.org> wrote:
>>>
>>> Richard Biener pointed out dysfunction in the SC.  The case of the
>>> missing question I asked in 2019 also points to that.  This response
>>> gives me no confidence that things will materially change.  I call for
>>> the dissolution of the SC, replacing it with a more open, functional and
>>> inclusive body (which includes, nothing).
>>
>> I'm fine with that in principle.  But it's like everything else with
>> GCC, and with free software in general: someone has to do the work.
>> We can't literally replace the SC with nothing, at least not unless we
>> do a much bigger overhaul of the GCC development process: someone has
>> to decide who is going to have maintainership rights and
>> responsibilities for different parts of the compiler.
> 
> Seeing the word "dysfunction" I don't remember using I want to clarify
> the non-openess which I intended to criticize.  The SC is not "open" because:
> - it appoints itself (new members, that is) - in fact in theory it
> should be appointed
>   by the FSF because the SC is the GNU maintainer of GCC
> - all requests and discussions are _private_ - the SC does not report to the
>   GCC project (it might report to the FSF which it is formally a delegate of)
> - you can reach the SC only indirectly (unless you know the secret mailing list
>   it operates on) - CC an SC member and hope a request is forwarded
> 
> now I understand the SC sees itself as buffer between GCC and the FSF (RMS
> in particular) and it thinks we need to be protected from direct engagement.  I
> think this is wrong.  I can very well say NO to RMS myself.
> 
> I'm actually curious how many of the 13 SC members actively contribute or
> whether the "SC show" is a one or two persons game and the "13" is just
> to make the SC appear as a big representative group of people.
> 
> Thus I request an archive of the SC mailing list be made publically available
> and the SC discussion from now on take place in an open forum (you can
> choose to moderate everybody so the discussion while carried out in open
> is still amongst SC members only).

Not sure if a completely open SC list would help, seeing other SC's or tech
boards having a private communication channel as well.  But +1 on a public point
of contact, with a ML archive behind.  Issues are involuntarily dropped, or not
communicated like last year's gm2 contribution which stayed silent for quiet a
while and the SC thought that a resolution had been communicated.

Matthias

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Mark Wielaard]

Hi Richard,

On Wed, Mar 31, 2021 at 03:21:01PM +0200, Richard Biener via Gcc wrote:
> That's all true.  It's still true that since GCC is a GNU project, formally
> its maintainers are appointed by RMS (I've just read the official governance
> structure document!).

I think this is unfair to the steering committee and misrepresents
what it means to be a GNU project. That "gnu-stucture" document was
written by RMS a couple of months ago and doesn't represent how the
GNU project and its maintainers have worked for years. It seems to
have been a reaction to various GNU maintainers getting together and
discussing how the GNU project should actually be governed and how it
should interact with the FSF as summarized here:
https://gnu.wildebeest.org/blog/mjw/2019/12/27/proposals-for-the-new-gnu-fsf-relationship/

RMS indeed claims to be the "Chief GNUisance" of the GNU project and
that that title somehow makes him the leader of the project and that
he appoints GNU maintainers. But that isn't how things work in
practice. GNU projects (packages) have almost total autonomy and in
general decide themselves who the maintainers are. RMS simply records
their decissions in the maintainer file so the FSF knows who the
volunteers responsible are. In the past when RMS was the FSF president
it was sometimes an advantage to discuss some (legal) issues with him,
but in practice the FSF staff often had more time to actually help.

I am pretty sure that is how the steering committee has worked
too. Yes they involved RMS from time to time to update the FSF records
for the current steering committee members and to have a more direct
line to the FSF when it needed to involve the FSF for legal guidance,
but that was more to make sure the FSF was up to date than to give RMS
any leadership role. I do think Nathan is right that the Steering
Committee should have been more clear about this up front and
especially two years ago when RMS stepped down as president of the
FSF. But that is water under the bridge now and the steering committee
did clarify the relationship.

> It's also true that the SC is only indirectly reachable,
> that we didn't vote on our representatives, or that there's no traces of
> its work (assuming it does any).  Just to point to the pieces that
> make it "not open".
> 
> > The reality is that the governance of GCC is extremely open because
> > it's performed by the developers in the community, not the GCC SC.
> > And GCC is much less bureaucratic than other, large Open Source
> > projects.  It doesn't have multiple committees and SIGs.  Everything
> > is worked out among the developers.  Projects are started by
> > developers who take the initiative to start a project.
> >
> > Be careful what you wish for because it may be much worse than the
> > freedom that you currently enjoy.
> 
> I'm actually enjoying not needing to interact with RMS or the FSF
> and indeed the SC appears to handle things well.  But since people
> are throwing in ideas to disassociate GCC from GNU I wanted to
> point out that GCC needs to think of its own governance structure.

I do think you have a point here. If GCC is going to disassociate
itself from the FSF it needs to find a different fiscal sponsor and
legal guardian for the project and that would be a good time to
re-formalize the GCC Steering Committee setup. But I also think David
is right. Be careful what you wish for :)

Cheers,

Mark

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Richard Biener]

On Thu, Apr 1, 2021 at 9:21 PM Ian Lance Taylor via Gcc <gcc@gcc.gnu.org> wrote:
>
> On Thu, Apr 1, 2021 at 10:08 AM Nathan Sidwell <nathan@acm.org> wrote:
> >
> > Richard Biener pointed out dysfunction in the SC.  The case of the
> > missing question I asked in 2019 also points to that.  This response
> > gives me no confidence that things will materially change.  I call for
> > the dissolution of the SC, replacing it with a more open, functional and
> > inclusive body (which includes, nothing).
>
> I'm fine with that in principle.  But it's like everything else with
> GCC, and with free software in general: someone has to do the work.
> We can't literally replace the SC with nothing, at least not unless we
> do a much bigger overhaul of the GCC development process: someone has
> to decide who is going to have maintainership rights and
> responsibilities for different parts of the compiler.

Seeing the word "dysfunction" I don't remember using I want to clarify
the non-openess which I intended to criticize.  The SC is not "open" because:
- it appoints itself (new members, that is) - in fact in theory it
should be appointed
  by the FSF because the SC is the GNU maintainer of GCC
- all requests and discussions are _private_ - the SC does not report to the
  GCC project (it might report to the FSF which it is formally a delegate of)
- you can reach the SC only indirectly (unless you know the secret mailing list
  it operates on) - CC an SC member and hope a request is forwarded

now I understand the SC sees itself as buffer between GCC and the FSF (RMS
in particular) and it thinks we need to be protected from direct engagement.  I
think this is wrong.  I can very well say NO to RMS myself.

I'm actually curious how many of the 13 SC members actively contribute or
whether the "SC show" is a one or two persons game and the "13" is just
to make the SC appear as a big representative group of people.

Thus I request an archive of the SC mailing list be made publically available
and the SC discussion from now on take place in an open forum (you can
choose to moderate everybody so the discussion while carried out in open
is still amongst SC members only).

Richard.

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Nathan Sidwell]

Ian,
thank you for taking the time to write this.  I appreciate that you have 
reached out.  I do have a couple of comments though.

On 4/1/21 3:19 PM, Ian Lance Taylor wrote:
> On Thu, Apr 1, 2021 at 10:08 AM Nathan Sidwell <nathan@acm.org> wrote:

> I think you want the steering committee to issue a statement about
> RMS's behavior.  I think that is approximately as likely as collecting
> the GCC maintainers together to issue a statement about RMS's
> behavior.  It's not impossible.  But it's not something anybody is
> really trying to do.

And that speaks volumes.  The one thing we have in the form of structure 
is not trying to do that thing.

> Going back to the GCC steering committee, you make several accusations
> (I think that is a fair word to use here).  Again I'm going to give my
> own personal reactions.  I'm telling the truth to the best of my
> recollection, but I can't prove what I say.

That's understandable.
>>   /You/ gave him controlling rights.
> 
> No, we didn't.  The pattern of his interactions with the steering
> committee, which were infrequent, was that he would ask us to do
> something, and we would explain why we were not going to do that.

The appearance is that the SC did.  Another event that I've now 
remembered concerns powerpc floating point.  My understanding is that 
RMS vetoed something, and an SC member reached out to me, as if the 
personal interactions of another SC member was something I could 
control.  If RMS had no power, that conversation need not have happened.

> Sorry, I don't quite understand this one.  It's not clear to me how
> the committee misled anyone.

by observable behaviour, including the listing on the web page -- who 
other than the SC could tell it was incorrect?  (perhaps you're 
associating intent with 'misled'?  I'm associating 'impact')

You're quite likely right about the timing of the C++ change, but the 
earlier interaction caused damage.

>> 2) Last year, I asked for libcody to be added as a subcomponent, with
>> its Apachev2 license intact.  AFAICT RMS was involved in that licensing
>> discussion, /for which I never received a response/.  He was not at the
>> FSF then, so he could not render any FSF licensing opinion.  Why was he
>> involved?  If he was not involved, how did he learn of it in order to
>> ask me questions about C++ modules?  I only emailed the SC and the
>> timing is too coincidental to draw a different conclusion.
> 
> Yes, we definitely dropped the ball on that.  Sorry.  If that ever
> happens again I would encourage you to ping.
> 
> I checked the mailing list archives.  Jeff and I expressed support for
> using libcody.  Nobody else said anything.  Certainly RMS didn't say
> anything, and it would have been astonishing if he had.  But, yes, he
> was CC'ed.

I've realized what happened was that I very quickly received an email 
saying just 'looks good to me'.  Which didn't read like an SC blessing 
at all.  I thought it was just personal comment.   You're right, I 
should have pinged, but one reason I didn't was because I was concerned 
RMS would veto the whole shebang.  Don't poke the sleeping bear.   Fault 
all round.

nathan
-- 
Nathan Sidwell

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Richard Kenner]

> If RMS had ever done the same (pretty unlikely, Fortran isnt't his
> thing), I would have done the same without thinking twice about it.

I agree with that sentiment.  The fact that somebody has a certain
role doesn't necessarily mean that the question is asked with that hat
on: it may be nothing more than curiousity.

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Thomas Koenig]

On 01.04.21 22:33, Joseph Myers wrote:
> And while in that case RMS probably learned of modules and libcody through
> the SC mailing list, in general he has this habit of asking GNU package
> developers random questions related to their packages.

I've been asked a few questions about gfortran by random people, which
I have always tried to answer correctly and courteously, with a copy
to the relevant mailing list.

If RMS had ever done the same (pretty unlikely, Fortran isnt't his
thing), I would have done the same without thinking twice about it.

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Christian Groessler]

On 4/1/21 10:33 PM, Joseph Myers wrote:
> RMS once asked me about the status of fused multiply-add support in glibc.
> I don't know why.  He wasn't asking for any changes or objecting to
> anything the glibc maintainers had done.  I'd hope that future Chief
> GNUisances won't try to get involved in details like that as part of their
> role as Chief GNUisance, because it's clearly outside the scope of such a
> role, and that if interested in such details as an individual free
> software developer (but not directly involved in development of the
> package in question) they will do more research of their own first and
> then approach the usual public mailing lists or other public discussion
> areas rather than individual developers.


So what? He asked you. I don't know why he asked and I don't see a bad 
intent in it.

This bashing is getting ridiculous now...

regards,
chris

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Joseph Myers]

On Thu, 1 Apr 2021, Ian Lance Taylor via Gcc wrote:

> > 2) Last year, I asked for libcody to be added as a subcomponent, with
> > its Apachev2 license intact.  AFAICT RMS was involved in that licensing
> > discussion, /for which I never received a response/.  He was not at the
> > FSF then, so he could not render any FSF licensing opinion.  Why was he
> > involved?  If he was not involved, how did he learn of it in order to
> > ask me questions about C++ modules?  I only emailed the SC and the
> > timing is too coincidental to draw a different conclusion.
> 
> Yes, we definitely dropped the ball on that.  Sorry.  If that ever
> happens again I would encourage you to ping.
> 
> I checked the mailing list archives.  Jeff and I expressed support for
> using libcody.  Nobody else said anything.  Certainly RMS didn't say
> anything, and it would have been astonishing if he had.  But, yes, he
> was CC'ed.

And while in that case RMS probably learned of modules and libcody through 
the SC mailing list, in general he has this habit of asking GNU package 
developers random questions related to their packages.

RMS once asked me about the status of fused multiply-add support in glibc.  
I don't know why.  He wasn't asking for any changes or objecting to 
anything the glibc maintainers had done.  I'd hope that future Chief 
GNUisances won't try to get involved in details like that as part of their 
role as Chief GNUisance, because it's clearly outside the scope of such a 
role, and that if interested in such details as an individual free 
software developer (but not directly involved in development of the 
package in question) they will do more research of their own first and 
then approach the usual public mailing lists or other public discussion 
areas rather than individual developers.

-- 
Joseph S. Myers
joseph@codesourcery.com

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Ian Lance Taylor]

On Thu, Apr 1, 2021 at 10:08 AM Nathan Sidwell <nathan@acm.org> wrote:
>
> You, the SC, have chosen to fix this as a clerical error.  The most
> do-nothing response, other than actually doing nothing.
>
> I am profoundly disappointed that you have not even acknowledged the
> harm RMS has caused.  Using passive voiced 'RMS was added' phrasing.
> You're not explicitly saying that was incorrect, and neither are you
> saying it was correct.   Your language attempts to distance you from
> your choices.
>
> 'we no longer feel the listing serves the best interest'.  'Therefore,
> we are removing him from the page FULLSTOP'. Well, at least that's not
> passive voice, but it is a milque-toast response.   You're not removing
> him from the SC, merely removing mention of him from the listing.
> You're not adding words to the website mentioning this historical
> ambiguity/error/misjudgement (you'd say if you were, right?).  You're
> not adding words acknowledging that RMS's involvement has been
> detrimental and repelled contributors.  Nor are you apologizing.  You're
> not owning your mistake.  You just hope the problem will silently go
> away.  The problem will not go away.
>
> /You/ involved RMS in SC discussions.  /You/ treated him as a member
> thereof.  /You/ gave him controlling rights.
>
> You have misled the majority of GCC developers, and the wider community
> by doing so.  If it looks like a duck, walks like a duck, and talks like
> a duck, it's a duck.  (As compiler developers for duck-typed languages,
> you should understand that.)
>
> You involved RMS prior to 2012, and continued to do so after.  Including
> after 2019 when he was no longer at the FSF.  Two instances I personally
> know of:
>
> 1) Sometime around 2005? maybe later, I lobbied to change gcc's
> implementation language to C++.  I failed because I'm lazy and learned I
> was arguing against an RMS effective veto.  (I learned this because Mark
> Mitchell informed me that some SC members were also pushing back against
> RMS's opposition to C++.  I was not privy to the actual SC discussion.)
>   If he was not an SC member, why was he even in that private
> conversation?  The public ML would have been more appropriate place for
> non-SC opinions to be voiced.  Just think, we could have transitioned to
> C++ earlier than we did, if it were not for the SC's inclusio of RMS.
>
> 2) Last year, I asked for libcody to be added as a subcomponent, with
> its Apachev2 license intact.  AFAICT RMS was involved in that licensing
> discussion, /for which I never received a response/.  He was not at the
> FSF then, so he could not render any FSF licensing opinion.  Why was he
> involved?  If he was not involved, how did he learn of it in order to
> ask me questions about C++ modules?  I only emailed the SC and the
> timing is too coincidental to draw a different conclusion.
>
> Interactions I've had with the SC, beyond maintainer appointment, seem
> to run into RMS.  (In the original email I mentioned a third interaction
> about RMS's position on the SC, which didn't do so, but also was
> decidedly one way.)
>
> You, the SC, do not state that you will not continue to involve RMS in
> discussions, just as you have done for the past 20 years.  You merely
> feel the listing is unfortunate.
>
> Your final paragraph is the corporate BS of hollow men.  Nice words, no
> specific actions.
>
> Richard Biener pointed out dysfunction in the SC.  The case of the
> missing question I asked in 2019 also points to that.  This response
> gives me no confidence that things will materially change.  I call for
> the dissolution of the SC, replacing it with a more open, functional and
> inclusive body (which includes, nothing).
>
> nathan
>
> FWIW, I am surprised that you, the SC, chose to respond only to the
> mailing list, and not CC me, the original complainant, of your decision.
>   Perhaps that seems petty, but it is personally insulting.


Nathan, you are clearly angry and frustrated.  I'm sorry about that.

I'm going to give some of my own personal opinions.  I'm not at all
speaking for the committee, and other committee members may disagree.

The steering committee is just a bunch of GCC hackers who originally
self-organized to manage the EGCS fork.  As it says at
https://gcc.gnu.org/steering.html, "committee members were chosen to
represent the interests of communities."  I was not on the steering
committee at the time, but I was somewhat involved with thinking about
who should be, and that statement accurately describes what we were
trying to do.  The intent was to ensure that when decisions were made
that covered the GCC project as a whole, all interested groups would
have a representative.

In practice the steering committee makes few decisions.  Naturally,
members of the committee work to improve GCC in various ways.  That
work almost never involves any sort of steering committee discussion.

I think you want the steering committee to issue a statement about
RMS's behavior.  I think that is approximately as likely as collecting
the GCC maintainers together to issue a statement about RMS's
behavior.  It's not impossible.  But it's not something anybody is
really trying to do.

Speaking for myself, personally, I will say that RMS has harmed
people, and he has to the best of my knowledge never acknowledged that
harm.  As such he should not be in a leadership position of any
organization.  The FSF should not have put RMS back on the board.  And
RMS should not be in a leadership position for GCC in particular.


Going back to the GCC steering committee, you make several accusations
(I think that is a fair word to use here).  Again I'm going to give my
own personal reactions.  I'm telling the truth to the best of my
recollection, but I can't prove what I say.


> /You/ involved RMS in SC discussions.

Yes, we did.  He never actually said anything in any discussion that
he did not start himself, but he was CC'ed.

> /You/ treated him as a member thereof.

Yes, we did.  He never actually voted on anything, and I don't know
what we would have done if he had, but he was treated as a member.

>  /You/ gave him controlling rights.

No, we didn't.  The pattern of his interactions with the steering
committee, which were infrequent, was that he would ask us to do
something, and we would explain why we were not going to do that.


> You have misled the majority of GCC developers, and the wider community
> by doing so.  If it looks like a duck, walks like a duck, and talks like
> a duck, it's a duck.

Sorry, I don't quite understand this one.  It's not clear to me how
the committee misled anyone.


> 1) Sometime around 2005? maybe later, I lobbied to change gcc's
> implementation language to C++.  I failed because I'm lazy and learned I
> was arguing against an RMS effective veto.  (I learned this because Mark
> Mitchell informed me that some SC members were also pushing back against
> RMS's opposition to C++.  I was not privy to the actual SC discussion.)
>   If he was not an SC member, why was he even in that private
> conversation?  The public ML would have been more appropriate place for
> non-SC opinions to be voiced.  Just think, we could have transitioned to
> C++ earlier than we did, if it were not for the SC's inclusio of RMS.

I wasn't on the committee at the time so I don't know what happened.
But honestly, as one of the main people who got GCC to convert to C++,
I don't think it could have happened any earlier.  For several years
at the GCC Summit, later the GNU Cauldron, I asked for a show of hands
for how many GCC developers were willing to convert to C++.  There
were strong and significant objections from numerous maintainers long
after 2005.  Certainly there were significant objections when I made
my presentation at the GCC Summit in 2008.  In 2010 the steering
committee (which I was not on at the time) approved the use of C++ for
GCC.  Even then it took several more years to make the switch.

So, yes, if RMS's concerns were the only reason that the steering
committee did not permit using C++ for GCC In 2005, that was wrong.
He should not have had a veto on GCC internal decisions.  But we
should not extrapolate from that to think that anything would have
happened differently on the technical side.

> 2) Last year, I asked for libcody to be added as a subcomponent, with
> its Apachev2 license intact.  AFAICT RMS was involved in that licensing
> discussion, /for which I never received a response/.  He was not at the
> FSF then, so he could not render any FSF licensing opinion.  Why was he
> involved?  If he was not involved, how did he learn of it in order to
> ask me questions about C++ modules?  I only emailed the SC and the
> timing is too coincidental to draw a different conclusion.

Yes, we definitely dropped the ball on that.  Sorry.  If that ever
happens again I would encourage you to ping.

I checked the mailing list archives.  Jeff and I expressed support for
using libcody.  Nobody else said anything.  Certainly RMS didn't say
anything, and it would have been astonishing if he had.  But, yes, he
was CC'ed.


> Richard Biener pointed out dysfunction in the SC.  The case of the
> missing question I asked in 2019 also points to that.  This response
> gives me no confidence that things will materially change.  I call for
> the dissolution of the SC, replacing it with a more open, functional and
> inclusive body (which includes, nothing).

I'm fine with that in principle.  But it's like everything else with
GCC, and with free software in general: someone has to do the work.
We can't literally replace the SC with nothing, at least not unless we
do a much bigger overhaul of the GCC development process: someone has
to decide who is going to have maintainership rights and
responsibilities for different parts of the compiler.

Again, I'm sorry for the ways in which the steering committee has made
you feel angry and frustrated.

Ian

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Nathan Sidwell]

On 3/31/21 2:27 PM, David Edelsohn via Gcc wrote:
> [I previously sent this from another email account, but it seems to be
> lost.  I am sending this on behalf of the GCC Steering Committee.]
> 
> In 2012 RMS was added to the GCC Steering Committee web page
> based on his role in the GNU Project, though his role as a member
> of the Steering Committee has been ambiguous and he was not a member
> of the Steering Committee when EGCS became GCC[1].  We no longer feel
> that this listing serves the best interests of the GCC developer and
> user community.  Therefore, we are removing him from the page.
> 
> GCC supports the principles of Free Software and has remained aligned
> with the GNU Project since EGCS became GCC, but effectively has continued
> to operate as an autonomous project.
> 
> The GCC Steering Committee is committed to providing a friendly, safe
> and welcoming environment for all, regardless of gender identity and
> expression, sexual orientation, disabilities, neurodiversity, physical
> appearance, body size, ethnicity, nationality, race, age, religion, or
> similar personal characteristics.
> 
> - The GCC Steering Committee
> 
> [1] https://static.lwn.net/1999/0429/a/gcc.html
> 

You, the SC, have chosen to fix this as a clerical error.  The most 
do-nothing response, other than actually doing nothing.

I am profoundly disappointed that you have not even acknowledged the 
harm RMS has caused.  Using passive voiced 'RMS was added' phrasing. 
You're not explicitly saying that was incorrect, and neither are you 
saying it was correct.   Your language attempts to distance you from 
your choices.

'we no longer feel the listing serves the best interest'.  'Therefore, 
we are removing him from the page FULLSTOP'. Well, at least that's not 
passive voice, but it is a milque-toast response.   You're not removing 
him from the SC, merely removing mention of him from the listing. 
You're not adding words to the website mentioning this historical 
ambiguity/error/misjudgement (you'd say if you were, right?).  You're 
not adding words acknowledging that RMS's involvement has been 
detrimental and repelled contributors.  Nor are you apologizing.  You're 
not owning your mistake.  You just hope the problem will silently go 
away.  The problem will not go away.

/You/ involved RMS in SC discussions.  /You/ treated him as a member 
thereof.  /You/ gave him controlling rights.

You have misled the majority of GCC developers, and the wider community 
by doing so.  If it looks like a duck, walks like a duck, and talks like 
a duck, it's a duck.  (As compiler developers for duck-typed languages, 
you should understand that.)

You involved RMS prior to 2012, and continued to do so after.  Including 
after 2019 when he was no longer at the FSF.  Two instances I personally 
know of:

1) Sometime around 2005? maybe later, I lobbied to change gcc's 
implementation language to C++.  I failed because I'm lazy and learned I 
was arguing against an RMS effective veto.  (I learned this because Mark 
Mitchell informed me that some SC members were also pushing back against 
RMS's opposition to C++.  I was not privy to the actual SC discussion.) 
  If he was not an SC member, why was he even in that private 
conversation?  The public ML would have been more appropriate place for 
non-SC opinions to be voiced.  Just think, we could have transitioned to 
C++ earlier than we did, if it were not for the SC's inclusio of RMS.

2) Last year, I asked for libcody to be added as a subcomponent, with 
its Apachev2 license intact.  AFAICT RMS was involved in that licensing 
discussion, /for which I never received a response/.  He was not at the 
FSF then, so he could not render any FSF licensing opinion.  Why was he 
involved?  If he was not involved, how did he learn of it in order to 
ask me questions about C++ modules?  I only emailed the SC and the 
timing is too coincidental to draw a different conclusion.

Interactions I've had with the SC, beyond maintainer appointment, seem 
to run into RMS.  (In the original email I mentioned a third interaction 
about RMS's position on the SC, which didn't do so, but also was 
decidedly one way.)

You, the SC, do not state that you will not continue to involve RMS in 
discussions, just as you have done for the past 20 years.  You merely 
feel the listing is unfortunate.

Your final paragraph is the corporate BS of hollow men.  Nice words, no 
specific actions.

Richard Biener pointed out dysfunction in the SC.  The case of the 
missing question I asked in 2019 also points to that.  This response 
gives me no confidence that things will materially change.  I call for 
the dissolution of the SC, replacing it with a more open, functional and 
inclusive body (which includes, nothing).

nathan

FWIW, I am surprised that you, the SC, chose to respond only to the 
mailing list, and not CC me, the original complainant, of your decision. 
  Perhaps that seems petty, but it is personally insulting.
-- 
Nathan Sidwell

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[David Edelsohn]

[I previously sent this from another email account, but it seems to be
lost.  I am sending this on behalf of the GCC Steering Committee.]

In 2012 RMS was added to the GCC Steering Committee web page
based on his role in the GNU Project, though his role as a member
of the Steering Committee has been ambiguous and he was not a member
of the Steering Committee when EGCS became GCC[1].  We no longer feel
that this listing serves the best interests of the GCC developer and
user community.  Therefore, we are removing him from the page.

GCC supports the principles of Free Software and has remained aligned
with the GNU Project since EGCS became GCC, but effectively has continued
to operate as an autonomous project.

The GCC Steering Committee is committed to providing a friendly, safe
and welcoming environment for all, regardless of gender identity and
expression, sexual orientation, disabilities, neurodiversity, physical
appearance, body size, ethnicity, nationality, race, age, religion, or
similar personal characteristics.

- The GCC Steering Committee

[1] https://static.lwn.net/1999/0429/a/gcc.html

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Ian Lance Taylor]

On Wed, Mar 31, 2021 at 7:44 AM Joel Sherrill <joel@rtems.org> wrote:
>
> On Wed, Mar 31, 2021 at 9:23 AM Paul Koning via Gcc <gcc@gcc.gnu.org> wrote:
>
> > I may have lost it in the enormous flood of text, but I want to ask these
> > general questions.
> >
> > 1. Is there a published code of conduct for GCC community members,
> > possibly different ones depending on which level of the organization you're
> > in?
> >
>
> As a GNU project, this should apply.:
>
> https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/kind-communication.en.html

Yes, although that is, by design, not a code of conduct as the term is
normally used.


> > 2. Is there a formal process for receiving claims of infraction of this
> > code, and for adjudicating such claims?
> >
>
> I admit to not looking for one but does any FLOSS organization have this?

Yes, many.  For example:

LLVM: https://llvm.org/docs/CodeOfConduct.html
Go: https://golang.org/conduct
Apache: https://www.apache.org/foundation/policies/conduct.html

and there are many more.

The GNU Cauldron also has a code of conduct:
https://gcc.gnu.org/wiki/cauldron2019#Code_of_Conduct

Ian

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Christopher Dimech]

> Sent: Thursday, April 01, 2021 at 2:56 AM
> From: "David Malcolm" <dmalcolm@redhat.com>
> To: "Christopher Dimech" <dimech@gmx.com>, "Mark Wielaard" <mark@klomp.org>
> Cc: "GCC Development" <gcc@gcc.gnu.org>, "Nathan Sidwell" <nathan@acm.org>
> Subject: Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee
>
> On Wed, 2021-03-31 at 16:18 +0200, Christopher Dimech via Gcc wrote:
> 
> [...snip...]
> 
> > As for the "safe spaces" phase, this is about eliminating anything
> > and
> > everything that could emotionally troubling students. This assumes a
> > high
> > degree of fragility among western students.  I work as a journalist
> > and
> > have had colleagues blown to smithereens - foot there, bits of brain
> > there.
> > I wonder how many of you bitches, have ever been shot or had a bomb
> > blown
> > up your ass.   
> 
> I've been attempting to decide if you're merely trolling us, or if you
> genuinely believe the stuff you've been posting to this list.
> 
> With your latest missive I'm leaning to the former interpretation, but
> if the latter, may I humbly suggest that referring to us as "bitches"
> might not be the best way to win people over, and that it's not normal
> to have to work in a literal war zone, and that most reasonable people
> do not want to work in a figurative war zone.
> 
> [...snip...]

I recognise it is not the best way, but the contempt is mainly directed
to those with a history of unjust accusations against Stallman.  
Although one can lean towards your interpretation, it is very easy to verify
my credentials.

https://www.corrieredimalta.com/coronavirus/la-diffusione-del-covid-19-a-malta-evento-b/

https://theshiftnews.com/2019/03/01/university-of-malta-building-fails-to-comply-with-safety-standards/

https://theshiftnews.com/2018/05/09/the-return-to-infantilism/

https://www.islesoftheleft.org/digital-rights-and-blockchain/



> Hope this is constructive
> Dave

Yes, I consider it constructive criticsism. 
 
> (my opinions only, not my employer's)
> 
>

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Ian Lance Taylor]

On Wed, Mar 31, 2021 at 5:28 AM Richard Biener via Gcc <gcc@gcc.gnu.org> wrote:
>
> And just to repeat - all the GCC governance structure (the "SC") represents
> all of the same non-openess as the FSF governance structure (because
> the "SC" is in fact appointed by the Chief GNUisance "or his delegates").

While that is true in a formal sense it's not true in a practical
sense.  In practice the steering committee appoints its own members.

That said I think it would be entirely reasonable to use a different
structure.  I just don't know what it would be.  The steering
committee doesn't really take very many actions, which is as it should
be.  The main and by and large only action is appointing, or perhaps a
better word would be anointing, maintainers: the people listed in the
MAINTAINERS file.

Thoughts on changing the steering committee system should probably be
on a separate thread from the RMS discussion.

Ian

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Richard Biener]

On March 31, 2021 5:23:09 PM GMT+02:00, David Edelsohn <dje.gcc@gmail.com> wrote:
>On Wed, Mar 31, 2021 at 9:46 AM Florian Weimer <fw@deneb.enyo.de>
>wrote:
>>
>> * David Edelsohn via Gcc:
>>
>> > Has the GCC SC blocked any new port or major feature?  Not that I'm
>aware of.
>>
>> What about the plugin framework?  The libgcc licensing change would
>> not have happened naturally.  Someone had to step in and delay the
>> plugin framework feature until the licensing changes were in place.
>
>I wrote blocked, not delayed.  In order to continue the alignment of
>GCC with the FSF, the GCC SC agreed to delay deployment of LTO and
>Plugins until a license to allow such features could be implemented.
>We didn't feel that a rupture with the FSF would be beneficial.
>
>Because I foresaw the need for such features and the need for the
>license to accommodate it, I had been designing and negotiating with
>the FSF for an appropriate license exception for years before LTO and
>Plugins were proposed.  Richard Stallman, Richard Fontana, Brad Kuhn
>and I all worked to resolve the issue.
>
>I and other members of the GCC SC have worked diligently behind the
>scenes to ensure that GCC and GNU Toolchain development can proceed as
>smoothly and unhindered as possible.  We have prevented or resolved
>many conflicts and issues without disturbing the broader community and
>allow the community to focus on its important tasks and great progress
>for the toolchain itself. I, at least, view that as my role as a
>member of the GCC SC.  It's like a good manager: regardless of the
>openness, hopefully the GCC community feels that the GCC SC "has their
>back", manages the politics, and removes real or potential roadblocks
>so that the software engineer can focus on being productive.

Indeed. I believe without the SC doing this GCC would either have disassociated itself from GNU (again) or be of marginal importance today (without those features). 

Richard. 

>
>Thanks, David

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[David Edelsohn]

On Wed, Mar 31, 2021 at 9:46 AM Florian Weimer <fw@deneb.enyo.de> wrote:
>
> * David Edelsohn via Gcc:
>
> > Has the GCC SC blocked any new port or major feature?  Not that I'm aware of.
>
> What about the plugin framework?  The libgcc licensing change would
> not have happened naturally.  Someone had to step in and delay the
> plugin framework feature until the licensing changes were in place.

I wrote blocked, not delayed.  In order to continue the alignment of
GCC with the FSF, the GCC SC agreed to delay deployment of LTO and
Plugins until a license to allow such features could be implemented.
We didn't feel that a rupture with the FSF would be beneficial.

Because I foresaw the need for such features and the need for the
license to accommodate it, I had been designing and negotiating with
the FSF for an appropriate license exception for years before LTO and
Plugins were proposed.  Richard Stallman, Richard Fontana, Brad Kuhn
and I all worked to resolve the issue.

I and other members of the GCC SC have worked diligently behind the
scenes to ensure that GCC and GNU Toolchain development can proceed as
smoothly and unhindered as possible.  We have prevented or resolved
many conflicts and issues without disturbing the broader community and
allow the community to focus on its important tasks and great progress
for the toolchain itself. I, at least, view that as my role as a
member of the GCC SC.  It's like a good manager: regardless of the
openness, hopefully the GCC community feels that the GCC SC "has their
back", manages the politics, and removes real or potential roadblocks
so that the software engineer can focus on being productive.

Thanks, David

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[David Malcolm]

On Wed, 2021-03-31 at 16:18 +0200, Christopher Dimech via Gcc wrote:

[...snip...]

> As for the "safe spaces" phase, this is about eliminating anything
> and
> everything that could emotionally troubling students. This assumes a
> high
> degree of fragility among western students.  I work as a journalist
> and
> have had colleagues blown to smithereens - foot there, bits of brain
> there.
> I wonder how many of you bitches, have ever been shot or had a bomb
> blown
> up your ass.   

I've been attempting to decide if you're merely trolling us, or if you
genuinely believe the stuff you've been posting to this list.

With your latest missive I'm leaning to the former interpretation, but
if the latter, may I humbly suggest that referring to us as "bitches"
might not be the best way to win people over, and that it's not normal
to have to work in a literal war zone, and that most reasonable people
do not want to work in a figurative war zone.

[...snip...]

Hope this is constructive
Dave

(my opinions only, not my employer's)

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Christopher Dimech]

> Sent: Thursday, April 01, 2021 at 1:28 AM
> From: "Giacomo Tesio" <giacomo@tesio.it>
> To: "Mark Wielaard" <mark@klomp.org>
> Cc: "GCC Development" <gcc@gcc.gnu.org>, "Nathan Sidwell" <nathan@acm.org>
> Subject: Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee
>
> Hi Mark,
>
> I'm a bit in a hurry and do not really want to focus on what happened
> in Harvey: to my eyes that story just show you cannot trust people just
> because they are nice and well known "open source" contributors, or
> because they work for big multinational that "do no evil" or even
> join the Good Guys (TM) of Software Freedom Conservancy.
>
> But let me clarify
>
> On Wed, 31 Mar 2021 13:34:17 +0200 Mark Wielaard wrote:
>
> > I looked a bit at that issue you filed and how they handled your
> > request to remove your code from the project. And I must say I don't
> > really understand what you believe they did wrong, they seemed to have
> > acknowledged and corrected their mistake and then removed all the code
> > you wanted to have removed.
>
> I asked them to `git revert` my changes referencing the issue, so that
> the code I reused in my own fork of Plan 9 was safe that nobody could
> claim copyright of my work after, say, a change in the version control
> system adopted by the project.
>
> Instead they did a `git rebase` over which, I was pretty surprised
> actually, they "accidentaly" squashed some of my own commits verbatim
> (but without my name) in incredibly large commits.
> And you know, they had to git push -f such rebase, breaking all the
> existing github forks (while the `git revert` approach would not have
> caused any issue to anybody)
>
> > There is some disagreement over whether a
> > mass change of function declarations is copyrightable or not.
>
> And implementations. And kernel changes that took a couple of days to
> get right (Harvey kernel was pretty unstable back then). And more I did
> not remember but I noticed back then:
>
>
> > But I happen to agree with them that if there is only one way to do
> > it, then having someone else do the same transformation is a correct
> > way to resolve this.
>
> Sure!
>
> But first, there were several different ways to do that (several
> equivalent typedefs were already in place in u.h, without even
> mentioning macros and so on), and more importantly if you actually
> redo the same work in the same way because there is a single way
> to do that, you do in a dedicated commit with an author that takes
> the clear responsibility for change.
>
> Instead my work (or a totally, byte-for-byte equivalent, one) got
> squashed into gigantic commits that include several very large commits
> of several authors (all mentioned in the commit message... but me).
>
>
> > To make this copyright issue somewhat relevant to GCC. GCC doesn't
> > currently contain individual copyright statements and most of the code
> > is currently assigned to the FSF. So the above mistake won't happen
> > when contributing to GCC, but mostly because of the technicality that
> > you sign away your copyright up front.
>
> Oh sorry, I wasn't clear enough about this.
>
> I'm SURE that this specific issue would not happen on GCC.
> Nor on Linux. Nor in several other Free Software and Open Source
> communities.
>
> But I think you are missing the valuable lesson that the Harvey team
> (some of which actually signed the rms-open-letter) tauht me: I didn't
> expected ANYTHING like this to happen. And I didn't expect SFC to not
> expell a project doing something like this.
>
> I trusted them both. All of them.
>
>
> So ultimately I do not expect this specific issue to occur in a
> hypothetical GCC lead by a Stallman-less Steering Comittee.
>
> But I DO expect that, in the long run, a Stallman-less Steering
> Comittee might do something not aligned with the long-term
> interests of Free Software, abusing my trust again.
>
> Maybe not you. Maybe not the CURRENT Steering Committee.
>
> But people, groups and incentives changes.
> Stallman does not.

It is likely that anothep person or group will evolve, which
although not Stallman-Like, work within the free software idea.

After Newton, there were other illustrious people.  Does not mean
everything stops forever after the demise of Richard.

> Giacomo
>

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Joel Sherrill]

On Wed, Mar 31, 2021 at 9:23 AM Paul Koning via Gcc <gcc@gcc.gnu.org> wrote:

> I may have lost it in the enormous flood of text, but I want to ask these
> general questions.
>
> 1. Is there a published code of conduct for GCC community members,
> possibly different ones depending on which level of the organization you're
> in?
>

As a GNU project, this should apply.:

https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/kind-communication.en.html


> 2. Is there a formal process for receiving claims of infraction of this
> code, and for adjudicating such claims?
>

I admit to not looking for one but does any FLOSS organization have this?

--joel


>
>         paul
>
>

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Paul Koning]

I may have lost it in the enormous flood of text, but I want to ask these general questions.

1. Is there a published code of conduct for GCC community members, possibly different ones depending on which level of the organization you're in?

2. Is there a formal process for receiving claims of infraction of this code, and for adjudicating such claims?

	paul

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Christopher Dimech]

> Sent: Wednesday, March 31, 2021 at 11:34 PM
> From: "Mark Wielaard" <mark@klomp.org>
> To: "Giacomo Tesio" <giacomo@tesio.it>
> Cc: "GCC Development" <gcc@gcc.gnu.org>, "Nathan Sidwell" <nathan@acm.org>
> Subject: Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee
>
> Hi Giacomo,
> 
> On Tue, Mar 30, 2021 at 11:28:49PM +0200, Giacomo Tesio wrote:
> > I've to say I'm a bit confused, but maybe we have different sources and
> > experience so we have different perspective on the matter.
> 
> Yes, I am pretty sure the perspective changes for people who have had
> longer, or more direct, exposure to Richard, while working on GNU or
> GCC over the years.
>  
> > That being said (and for full disclosure), I also consider his return to
> > the FSF fair, because the shitstorm that caused his resign two years
> > ago was built on top of a severe misrepresentation of his words, as
> > described here https://jorgemorais.gitlab.io/justice-for-rms/ and
> > admitted also by the people arguing against his return (see the
> > various edits at https://rms-open-letter.github.io/appendix ).
> 
> So this for example depends on whether you believe this is the one and
> only incident that can easily be explained away or if it is a decades
> long pattern of behavior where people finally had enough. See for
> example this blog that links and lists various other past events
> https://www.harihareswara.net/sumana/2021/03/26/0

In 2017, Marianne Corvellec was discussing GNU Philosophy and his
elaborations were valid.  Having worked with both, I agree with       
Richard stance.

Regarding, the Glibc Controversy, the comment was a criticism about
the United States Federal Censorship Regulations that were being
proposed.  This was the result of Roe vs. Wade that affirmed a woman’s
constitutional right to an abortion.  Opponents of the ruling have
steadfastly refused to accept it, and have tried to overturn it altogether.

I disagree with the conclusions resulting from Roe vs. Wade.  Doing what
you want does not mean you can act at any level of irresponsibility.  People
have to understand this - there are many documented cases where families 
have killed their own daughters.  I am particularly saying this because it
happens more to girls.  Because the parents believe that after they are
their children and if things don't turn out the way they wanted, they 
can kill them.

I personally disagree with Stallman regarding the joke.  But, I do not
fall within the camp that worked to remove it.

As for the "safe spaces" phase, this is about eliminating anything and
everything that could emotionally troubling students. This assumes a high
degree of fragility among western students.  I work as a journalist and
have had colleagues blown to smithereens - foot there, bits of brain there.
I wonder how many of you bitches, have ever been shot or had a bomb blown
up your ass.   

After scrutinising many of the presented arguments for removing Richard
Stallman from public and working life.  

I have to conclude that the drive is another ridiculous and sad story of a 
smear campaign in the media and on social networks.  This includes the big
companies that do a lot of high level work for the government and for big
corporations - e.g. Red Hat subsidiary of IBM, Facebook.  Digging into minor
and fabricated events to somehow attack his credibility.

Peaple have lost the narrative.  I therefore deplore the offensive against 
Richard Stallman and those who support him.  I see a huge opportunity for
journalists to dig into the real story.

> You are referencing the recent open letter which isn't really what
> people are discussing here. Although many probably sympathize with
> calling for the removal of the entire Board of the Free Software
> Foundation and calling for Richard M. Stallman to be removed from all
> leadership positions, including the GNU Project
> 
> You can disagree with the specific way that was worded and still come
> to the same conclusion. See for example https://www.arp242.net/rms.html
> 
> > On Tue, 30 Mar 2021 18:50:52 +0200 Martin Jambor wrote:
> > 
> > > Nobody suggested that GCC would be relicensed and certainly not to a
> > > non-free license.  If you decide to contribute your port upstream, it
> > > will be safe with us, regardless of who will or will not be on the
> > > steering committee
> > 
> > When I joined the Harvey project they were all fun and welcoming.
> > When I asked how and where to write my copyright statement, I was
> > answered by the seasoned and well known Google's engineer that a few
> > years later completely removed my name from the project without
> > removing the contributions.
> > 
> > Harvey is copylefted too (GPLv2) and as you know, this sort of
> > behaviour would trigger GPL termination, but Harvey is part of
> > Software Freedom Conservancy and the violation of my copyright
> > likely occurred during the working hours of the above engineer.
> > 
> > So they were the good guys and the most powerful guys, together.
> > I had no hope in a US court (and I'm Italian and... let say "not rich").
> > 
> > 
> > They taught me a valuable lesson, though.
> > 
> > In the long run, even the good guys betray your trust if they have a
> > reason to and they think they can get away with that.
> 
> I looked a bit at that issue you filed and how they handled your
> request to remove your code from the project. And I must say I don't
> really understand what you believe they did wrong, they seemed to have
> acknowledged and corrected their mistake and then removed all the code
> you wanted to have removed. There is some disagreement over whether a
> mass change of function declarations is copyrightable or not. But I
> happen to agree with them that if there is only one way to do it, then
> having someone else do the same transformation is a correct way to
> resolve this. I am not sure I understand your goal in this particular
> case. Sorry.
> 
> To make this copyright issue somewhat relevant to GCC. GCC doesn't
> currently contain individual copyright statements and most of the code
> is currently assigned to the FSF. So the above mistake won't happen
> when contributing to GCC, but mostly because of the technicality that
> you sign away your copyright up front.
> 
> > This means that its core value, its main "selling point", is not how
> > cool it is, but how it is designed, developed and distributed to
> > maximise software freedom.
> > 
> > IOW, I can imagine scenarios where some features should NOT be
> > introduced to reach this political goal which is MORE important
> > than the technical goal of compiler suite
> > 
> > To this aim, I'd prefer to see RMS in the GCC's SC.
> > Because to me GCC is not just "open source", it's not just matter of
> > seeing the source: it's Free Software, it should be designed and
> > developed TO maximize software freedom!
> 
> But even here RMS is just one voice and his insights are not always
> very accurate. His technical knowledge of the code base and of the
> community who develops the code is simply not always current. That
> doesn't mean he cannot understand the technology, he can, he still is
> really smart. But it takes very long (months) to get him up to
> speed. Once he understand the issue he often comes to the right
> conclusion. But sometimes he doesn't because he doesn't have the full
> picture. If he doesn't it might take months again to convince him he
> was wrong. Which he will never admit, he will simply say people didn't
> inform him about some change in technology or community participation,
> when he changes his opinion. Yes, he always wants to maximize software
> freedom, and so do many others with him, but his ideas of how to
> design and develop code to achieve that aren't always accurate or
> effective.
> 
> > On Tue, 30 Mar 2021 14:09:26 -0400 JeanHeyd Meneide wrote:
> > 
> > > >      My problem is Dr. Richard M. Stallman stands credibly and
> > > > factually accused of Doxxing and GCC contributor/participant and
> > > > knowingly manipulating the project for his own personal reasons.  
> > > 
> > > This should be "RMS explicitly sanctioned, encouraged, and
> > > blessed the Doxxing of an individual". Apologies, he did not do the
> > > doxxing himself; this was a fat finger on my part. 
> > 
> > Thanks for the clarification. I was quite surprised actually, because
> > I didn't read such accuse among the others in the rms-open-letter.
> > 
> > Did it happen on a public mailing list I can read?
> > Or maybe in a public forum? Or something that has been published
> > somewhere?
> 
> I think this is actually two separate incidents of women being
> harassed on a public gnu mailinglist for speaking up against Richard's
> behavior. One happening about a year ago, another last week. Both by
> individuals who were "defending" RMS. Whether to call them doxxing
> depends on your definition. I would say the last one clearly was, the
> first one might "just" have been "normal" vile, misogynist and racist.
> 
> Some of it was on private gnu lists, where people were called
> subhumans and nazis. Which was obviously not a healthy environment to
> have a discussion. So we asked the FSF Executive Director for a public
> place to discuss GNU governance where we could have rules against such
> hate speech and he agreed. Sadly when a woman (GCC contributor) spoke
> up she got attacked in such a vile way we had to block/moderate some
> posts. RMS disagreed with the public discussion and assumed the
> moderators were preventing people from voicing certain opinions so
> arranged for new moderators to take over the list that he assumed were
> loyal to him and then said...
> 
> > The new moderators have now allowed people to defend the GNU Project
> > and to defend me personally.  If you would like to do these things,
> > please do not hold back.
> 
> I am not going to link to the public discussion that resulted because
> of his call to action. It was truly horrible. I am also not going to
> link to the latest doxxing campaign of the other woman because even
> though the link to her picture, address and police station have been
> removed from the archives what is left is almost equally bad. The
> people involved (even if they acted for RMS, they did so in good faith)
> don't deserve to be a target even more. And it doesn't help the
> healing process to relitigate this incident. It happened, that is
> painful enough.
> 
> Again, it isn't about this one or two incidents. I am sure someone can
> find a way to explained it away by saying people simply misunderstood
> his intentions or that no law was broken. But it is about a pattern of
> behavior that shows RMS creates a misogynist, racist and transphobic
> environment by (hopefully unknowingly) setting the example that others
> will then follow and amplify.
> 
> Cheers,
> 
> Mark
>

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Jonathan Wakely]

On Wed, 31 Mar 2021 at 14:30, Giacomo Tesio wrote:
> But people, groups and incentives changes.
> Stallman does not.

Well, he's not immortal. Are you really suggesting that his crowning
achievement (the free software movement and copyleft) is actually not
sustainable, and only works if he's watching?

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Florian Weimer]

* David Edelsohn via Gcc:

> Has the GCC SC blocked any new port or major feature?  Not that I'm aware of.

What about the plugin framework?  The libgcc licensing change would
not have happened naturally.  Someone had to step in and delay the
plugin framework feature until the licensing changes were in place.

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Giacomo Tesio]

Hi Mark,

I'm a bit in a hurry and do not really want to focus on what happened
in Harvey: to my eyes that story just show you cannot trust people just
because they are nice and well known "open source" contributors, or
because they work for big multinational that "do no evil" or even
join the Good Guys (TM) of Software Freedom Conservancy.

But let me clarify 

On Wed, 31 Mar 2021 13:34:17 +0200 Mark Wielaard wrote:

> I looked a bit at that issue you filed and how they handled your
> request to remove your code from the project. And I must say I don't
> really understand what you believe they did wrong, they seemed to have
> acknowledged and corrected their mistake and then removed all the code
> you wanted to have removed. 

I asked them to `git revert` my changes referencing the issue, so that
the code I reused in my own fork of Plan 9 was safe that nobody could
claim copyright of my work after, say, a change in the version control
system adopted by the project.

Instead they did a `git rebase` over which, I was pretty surprised
actually, they "accidentaly" squashed some of my own commits verbatim
(but without my name) in incredibly large commits.
And you know, they had to git push -f such rebase, breaking all the
existing github forks (while the `git revert` approach would not have
caused any issue to anybody)

> There is some disagreement over whether a
> mass change of function declarations is copyrightable or not.

And implementations. And kernel changes that took a couple of days to
get right (Harvey kernel was pretty unstable back then). And more I did
not remember but I noticed back then: 


> But I happen to agree with them that if there is only one way to do
> it, then having someone else do the same transformation is a correct
> way to resolve this.

Sure!

But first, there were several different ways to do that (several
equivalent typedefs were already in place in u.h, without even
mentioning macros and so on), and more importantly if you actually
redo the same work in the same way because there is a single way
to do that, you do in a dedicated commit with an author that takes
the clear responsibility for change.

Instead my work (or a totally, byte-for-byte equivalent, one) got
squashed into gigantic commits that include several very large commits
of several authors (all mentioned in the commit message... but me).


> To make this copyright issue somewhat relevant to GCC. GCC doesn't
> currently contain individual copyright statements and most of the code
> is currently assigned to the FSF. So the above mistake won't happen
> when contributing to GCC, but mostly because of the technicality that
> you sign away your copyright up front.

Oh sorry, I wasn't clear enough about this.

I'm SURE that this specific issue would not happen on GCC.
Nor on Linux. Nor in several other Free Software and Open Source
communities.

But I think you are missing the valuable lesson that the Harvey team
(some of which actually signed the rms-open-letter) tauht me: I didn't
expected ANYTHING like this to happen. And I didn't expect SFC to not
expell a project doing something like this.

I trusted them both. All of them.


So ultimately I do not expect this specific issue to occur in a
hypothetical GCC lead by a Stallman-less Steering Comittee.

But I DO expect that, in the long run, a Stallman-less Steering
Comittee might do something not aligned with the long-term
interests of Free Software, abusing my trust again.

Maybe not you. Maybe not the CURRENT Steering Committee.

But people, groups and incentives changes.
Stallman does not.


Giacomo

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Giacomo Tesio]

Hi Martin,

On Wed, 31 Mar 2021 10:53:20 +0200 Martin Jambor wrote:

> Dear Giacomo,
> 
> On Tue, Mar 30 2021, Giacomo Tesio wrote:
> > On Tue, 30 Mar 2021 18:50:52 +0200 Martin Jambor wrote:
> >  
> >> Unfortunately, all people are also able to close their eyes and
> >> ears and ignore mistreatment when they are not the victims and
> >> when their friend or their favorite public figure is the
> >> perpetrator.  
> >
> > Martin, what you imply here, is an insult I do not deserve.  
> 
> I am sorry.

No problem, apology accepted! ;-)

> I wanted to underline that the questions discussed here
> are not cultural or somehow defined geographically.

But it IS cultural (and thus storical and geographical): we interpret
any datum according to our existing knowledge and perspectives.

It's happening even now: I write these words trying to express what I
think in my mind and in the very instant you are reading them, you
interpret them according to your current positions and beliefs.


> > But in Italy we have a legal principle called "Presumption of
> > innocence".  
> 
> Nevertheless, I am convinced that all the many accusations are clear,
> consistent and most of them are beyond any doubt (a lot of it is on
> RMS's own blog).

If you consider software as a form of human expression and Free
Software as an obvious extension of Free Speech (that is a complex
human right, probably the most complex as it has to be balanced BY LAW
with all the others, privacy and personal safety above all), I think
you can see how controversial positions on a personal blogs cannot
constitute a valid argument against RMS.

If you marginalize people with controversial (but legal) positions you
select people that only do vague statements that everybody can
interpret as they like.

Ultimately, you select people whose real opinions you do not really
know and that only pretend to defend "Free Software as in Free Speech" 
because they do not practice Free Speech at all.

> They easily clear the bar for legitimate reasons why
> he should not be an official representative of GCC.
>
> I do not understand people which keep doubting the "evidence" or
> describe it as hearsay, the only explanation I can think of is that
> they simply do not wish to not accept the facts.  If you are certain
> that this is not your case (no "proof" or explanation necessary) then
> please accept my apologies.

Again, apologies accepted. :-)


Giacomo

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Richard Biener]

On Wed, Mar 31, 2021 at 2:59 PM David Edelsohn <dje.gcc@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On Wed, Mar 31, 2021 at 8:28 AM Richard Biener via Gcc <gcc@gcc.gnu.org> wrote:
> >
> > On Wed, Mar 31, 2021 at 1:36 PM Mark Wielaard <mark@klomp.org> wrote:
> > >
> > > You are referencing the recent open letter which isn't really what
> > > people are discussing here. Although many probably sympathize with
> > > calling for the removal of the entire Board of the Free Software
> > > Foundation and calling for Richard M. Stallman to be removed from all
> > > leadership positions, including the GNU Project
> > >
> > > You can disagree with the specific way that was worded and still come
> > > to the same conclusion. See for example https://www.arp242.net/rms.html
> >
> > Ah, this one is _very_ well written and captures my thoughts when
> > writing my response to Nathan (but not willing to spend so much time
> > on this to coherently formulate what I was thinking).
> >
> > And just to repeat - all the GCC governance structure (the "SC") represents
> > all of the same non-openess as the FSF governance structure (because
> > the "SC" is in fact appointed by the Chief GNUisance "or his delegates").
>
> Richard historically has approved nominees to the GCC SC because the
> GNU Project considers the SC the official "maintainers" of GCC, but he
> has not nominated or suggested any of the members.  I don't remember
> him rejecting a proposed nominee.  And many major contributors to GCC
> have not wished to be members of the GCC SC whose major purpose is to
> be a buffer between the GCC Community and the Free Software
> Foundation.
>
> Has the GCC SC micro-managed you or prevented you from doing anything
> as Global Reviewer and Release Manager?  Not that I'm aware of.
>
> Has the GCC SC blocked any new port or major feature?  Not that I'm aware of.
>
> Has the GCC SC blocked any qualified maintainer nominations?  Not that
> I'm aware of.
>
> Has the GCC SC instructed GCC developers on which features to work?  No.
>
> Has the GCC SC inserted itself or voted on any disagreements?  No.

That's all true.  It's still true that since GCC is a GNU project, formally
its maintainers are appointed by RMS (I've just read the official governance
structure document!).  It's also true that the SC is only indirectly reachable,
that we didn't vote on our representatives, or that there's no traces of
its work (assuming it does any).  Just to point to the pieces that
make it "not open".

> The reality is that the governance of GCC is extremely open because
> it's performed by the developers in the community, not the GCC SC.
> And GCC is much less bureaucratic than other, large Open Source
> projects.  It doesn't have multiple committees and SIGs.  Everything
> is worked out among the developers.  Projects are started by
> developers who take the initiative to start a project.
>
> Be careful what you wish for because it may be much worse than the
> freedom that you currently enjoy.

I'm actually enjoying not needing to interact with RMS or the FSF
and indeed the SC appears to handle things well.  But since people
are throwing in ideas to disassociate GCC from GNU I wanted to
point out that GCC needs to think of its own governance structure.

Richard.

>
> Thanks, David

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[David Edelsohn]

On Wed, Mar 31, 2021 at 8:28 AM Richard Biener via Gcc <gcc@gcc.gnu.org> wrote:
>
> On Wed, Mar 31, 2021 at 1:36 PM Mark Wielaard <mark@klomp.org> wrote:
> >
> > You are referencing the recent open letter which isn't really what
> > people are discussing here. Although many probably sympathize with
> > calling for the removal of the entire Board of the Free Software
> > Foundation and calling for Richard M. Stallman to be removed from all
> > leadership positions, including the GNU Project
> >
> > You can disagree with the specific way that was worded and still come
> > to the same conclusion. See for example https://www.arp242.net/rms.html
>
> Ah, this one is _very_ well written and captures my thoughts when
> writing my response to Nathan (but not willing to spend so much time
> on this to coherently formulate what I was thinking).
>
> And just to repeat - all the GCC governance structure (the "SC") represents
> all of the same non-openess as the FSF governance structure (because
> the "SC" is in fact appointed by the Chief GNUisance "or his delegates").

Richard historically has approved nominees to the GCC SC because the
GNU Project considers the SC the official "maintainers" of GCC, but he
has not nominated or suggested any of the members.  I don't remember
him rejecting a proposed nominee.  And many major contributors to GCC
have not wished to be members of the GCC SC whose major purpose is to
be a buffer between the GCC Community and the Free Software
Foundation.

Has the GCC SC micro-managed you or prevented you from doing anything
as Global Reviewer and Release Manager?  Not that I'm aware of.

Has the GCC SC blocked any new port or major feature?  Not that I'm aware of.

Has the GCC SC blocked any qualified maintainer nominations?  Not that
I'm aware of.

Has the GCC SC instructed GCC developers on which features to work?  No.

Has the GCC SC inserted itself or voted on any disagreements?  No.

The reality is that the governance of GCC is extremely open because
it's performed by the developers in the community, not the GCC SC.
And GCC is much less bureaucratic than other, large Open Source
projects.  It doesn't have multiple committees and SIGs.  Everything
is worked out among the developers.  Projects are started by
developers who take the initiative to start a project.

Be careful what you wish for because it may be much worse than the
freedom that you currently enjoy.

Thanks, David

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Jonathan Wakely]

On Wed, 31 Mar 2021 at 13:29, Richard Biener wrote:
> And just to repeat - all the GCC governance structure (the "SC") represents
> all of the same non-openess as the FSF governance structure (because
> the "SC" is in fact appointed by the Chief GNUisance "or his delegates").

The SC was appointed by the egcs community. They were then blessed as
"the official GNU maintainer" of the GNU project when egcs replaced
gcc as "the compiler for the GNU system", but we don't have to *be* a
GNU project. GNU cannot remove the SC, if they tried we'd just say
we're independent of GNU and then they don't get to have a say.

So no, the SC is not appointed by RMS, except in the same way that the
UK government is "chosen" by the Queen. By convention she appoints a
Prime Minister (the SC) and asks the PM to form a government (the GCC
devs). But in reality her "choice" is the party that won the election.
She is not allowed to choose for herself, or there would be ...
problems. If RMS or GNU tried to "choose" a new maintainer or replace
the SC, there would be ... problems.

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Jonathan Wakely]

On Wed, 31 Mar 2021 at 12:36, Mark Wielaard wrote:
> Again, it isn't about this one or two incidents. I am sure someone can
> find a way to explained it away by saying people simply misunderstood
> his intentions or that no law was broken. But it is about a pattern of
> behavior that shows RMS creates a misogynist, racist and transphobic
> environment by (hopefully unknowingly) setting the example that others
> will then follow and amplify.

Probably unintentionally, but he has allowed the GNU Project to become
a nasty cult of personality. The FSF seems to be imploding (with mass
resignations in the past week). I don't think GCC benefits from being
associated with either of them.

Is there any incident where FSF being the copyright holder for GCC has
made a difference? Are there any GPL violations involving GCC code
that were resolved only because all copyright resides with a single
entity, that couldn't have been resolved on behalf of individual
copyright holders?

Are we still worried about BigCorp trying to do a proprietary fork of
GCC? Because BigCorp, OtherCorp etc. have shown that they would prefer
to create a new toolchain from scratch rather than use GNU code. And
if EvilCorp want to make their own proprietary compiler with secret
optimizations, they'll just use LLVM instead of bothering to violate
the GPL. The work done to make it impossible to steal GCC code was a
success: nobody is even interested in stealing it now. There is an
easier option.

Can we break our (already weak) ties to GNU?

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Richard Biener]

On Wed, Mar 31, 2021 at 1:36 PM Mark Wielaard <mark@klomp.org> wrote:
>
> You are referencing the recent open letter which isn't really what
> people are discussing here. Although many probably sympathize with
> calling for the removal of the entire Board of the Free Software
> Foundation and calling for Richard M. Stallman to be removed from all
> leadership positions, including the GNU Project
>
> You can disagree with the specific way that was worded and still come
> to the same conclusion. See for example https://www.arp242.net/rms.html

Ah, this one is _very_ well written and captures my thoughts when
writing my response to Nathan (but not willing to spend so much time
on this to coherently formulate what I was thinking).

And just to repeat - all the GCC governance structure (the "SC") represents
all of the same non-openess as the FSF governance structure (because
the "SC" is in fact appointed by the Chief GNUisance "or his delegates").

Richard.

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Mark Wielaard]

Hi Giacomo,

On Tue, Mar 30, 2021 at 11:28:49PM +0200, Giacomo Tesio wrote:
> I've to say I'm a bit confused, but maybe we have different sources and
> experience so we have different perspective on the matter.

Yes, I am pretty sure the perspective changes for people who have had
longer, or more direct, exposure to Richard, while working on GNU or
GCC over the years.
 
> That being said (and for full disclosure), I also consider his return to
> the FSF fair, because the shitstorm that caused his resign two years
> ago was built on top of a severe misrepresentation of his words, as
> described here https://jorgemorais.gitlab.io/justice-for-rms/ and
> admitted also by the people arguing against his return (see the
> various edits at https://rms-open-letter.github.io/appendix ).

So this for example depends on whether you believe this is the one and
only incident that can easily be explained away or if it is a decades
long pattern of behavior where people finally had enough. See for
example this blog that links and lists various other past events
https://www.harihareswara.net/sumana/2021/03/26/0

You are referencing the recent open letter which isn't really what
people are discussing here. Although many probably sympathize with
calling for the removal of the entire Board of the Free Software
Foundation and calling for Richard M. Stallman to be removed from all
leadership positions, including the GNU Project

You can disagree with the specific way that was worded and still come
to the same conclusion. See for example https://www.arp242.net/rms.html

> On Tue, 30 Mar 2021 18:50:52 +0200 Martin Jambor wrote:
> 
> > Nobody suggested that GCC would be relicensed and certainly not to a
> > non-free license.  If you decide to contribute your port upstream, it
> > will be safe with us, regardless of who will or will not be on the
> > steering committee
> 
> When I joined the Harvey project they were all fun and welcoming.
> When I asked how and where to write my copyright statement, I was
> answered by the seasoned and well known Google's engineer that a few
> years later completely removed my name from the project without
> removing the contributions.
> 
> Harvey is copylefted too (GPLv2) and as you know, this sort of
> behaviour would trigger GPL termination, but Harvey is part of
> Software Freedom Conservancy and the violation of my copyright
> likely occurred during the working hours of the above engineer.
> 
> So they were the good guys and the most powerful guys, together.
> I had no hope in a US court (and I'm Italian and... let say "not rich").
> 
> 
> They taught me a valuable lesson, though.
> 
> In the long run, even the good guys betray your trust if they have a
> reason to and they think they can get away with that.

I looked a bit at that issue you filed and how they handled your
request to remove your code from the project. And I must say I don't
really understand what you believe they did wrong, they seemed to have
acknowledged and corrected their mistake and then removed all the code
you wanted to have removed. There is some disagreement over whether a
mass change of function declarations is copyrightable or not. But I
happen to agree with them that if there is only one way to do it, then
having someone else do the same transformation is a correct way to
resolve this. I am not sure I understand your goal in this particular
case. Sorry.

To make this copyright issue somewhat relevant to GCC. GCC doesn't
currently contain individual copyright statements and most of the code
is currently assigned to the FSF. So the above mistake won't happen
when contributing to GCC, but mostly because of the technicality that
you sign away your copyright up front.

> This means that its core value, its main "selling point", is not how
> cool it is, but how it is designed, developed and distributed to
> maximise software freedom.
> 
> IOW, I can imagine scenarios where some features should NOT be
> introduced to reach this political goal which is MORE important
> than the technical goal of compiler suite
> 
> To this aim, I'd prefer to see RMS in the GCC's SC.
> Because to me GCC is not just "open source", it's not just matter of
> seeing the source: it's Free Software, it should be designed and
> developed TO maximize software freedom!

But even here RMS is just one voice and his insights are not always
very accurate. His technical knowledge of the code base and of the
community who develops the code is simply not always current. That
doesn't mean he cannot understand the technology, he can, he still is
really smart. But it takes very long (months) to get him up to
speed. Once he understand the issue he often comes to the right
conclusion. But sometimes he doesn't because he doesn't have the full
picture. If he doesn't it might take months again to convince him he
was wrong. Which he will never admit, he will simply say people didn't
inform him about some change in technology or community participation,
when he changes his opinion. Yes, he always wants to maximize software
freedom, and so do many others with him, but his ideas of how to
design and develop code to achieve that aren't always accurate or
effective.

> On Tue, 30 Mar 2021 14:09:26 -0400 JeanHeyd Meneide wrote:
> 
> > >      My problem is Dr. Richard M. Stallman stands credibly and
> > > factually accused of Doxxing and GCC contributor/participant and
> > > knowingly manipulating the project for his own personal reasons.  
> > 
> > This should be "RMS explicitly sanctioned, encouraged, and
> > blessed the Doxxing of an individual". Apologies, he did not do the
> > doxxing himself; this was a fat finger on my part. 
> 
> Thanks for the clarification. I was quite surprised actually, because
> I didn't read such accuse among the others in the rms-open-letter.
> 
> Did it happen on a public mailing list I can read?
> Or maybe in a public forum? Or something that has been published
> somewhere?

I think this is actually two separate incidents of women being
harassed on a public gnu mailinglist for speaking up against Richard's
behavior. One happening about a year ago, another last week. Both by
individuals who were "defending" RMS. Whether to call them doxxing
depends on your definition. I would say the last one clearly was, the
first one might "just" have been "normal" vile, misogynist and racist.

Some of it was on private gnu lists, where people were called
subhumans and nazis. Which was obviously not a healthy environment to
have a discussion. So we asked the FSF Executive Director for a public
place to discuss GNU governance where we could have rules against such
hate speech and he agreed. Sadly when a woman (GCC contributor) spoke
up she got attacked in such a vile way we had to block/moderate some
posts. RMS disagreed with the public discussion and assumed the
moderators were preventing people from voicing certain opinions so
arranged for new moderators to take over the list that he assumed were
loyal to him and then said...

> The new moderators have now allowed people to defend the GNU Project
> and to defend me personally.  If you would like to do these things,
> please do not hold back.

I am not going to link to the public discussion that resulted because
of his call to action. It was truly horrible. I am also not going to
link to the latest doxxing campaign of the other woman because even
though the link to her picture, address and police station have been
removed from the archives what is left is almost equally bad. The
people involved (even if they acted for RMS, they did so in good faith)
don't deserve to be a target even more. And it doesn't help the
healing process to relitigate this incident. It happened, that is
painful enough.

Again, it isn't about this one or two incidents. I am sure someone can
find a way to explained it away by saying people simply misunderstood
his intentions or that no law was broken. But it is about a pattern of
behavior that shows RMS creates a misogynist, racist and transphobic
environment by (hopefully unknowingly) setting the example that others
will then follow and amplify.

Cheers,

Mark

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Franz Fehringer]

To me (not being a contributor) this is the best contribution to the 
discussion so far.


Am 30.03.2021 um 17:24 schrieb Maksim Fomin via Gcc:
> ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐ Original Message ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐
> On Friday, 26 March 2021 г., 23:02, Nathan Sidwell <nathan@acm.org> wrote:
>
>> I would rather not have to write this email. Like many developers, I just want
>> to write code. Right now we’re working towards the GCC 11 release. I thought
>> about deferring this email. But there’s never a good time, and bad behaviour
>> needs to be addressed in the moment. I have left this for too long already.
>>
>> I used to think of GCC development as egalitarian, and therefore fair, and, by
>> assumption, welcoming. That is not true. I’m a white dude with a British accent.
>> /Of course/ I have white male privilege. I used to joke that I fell into every
>> job I’ve had (including my doctorate) – that, right there, is white male
>> privilege.
>>
>> Perhaps you discount the benefits of white male privilege. You’re wrong.
>>
>> You cannot have missed the sparsity of women and people of color in compiler
>> engineering (kaporcenter black tech workforce). Maybe you fallaciously put that
>> down to imbalances in education (leakytechpipeline) How can we, the GCC
>> community, be expected to address that? Representation matters, we’re the problem.
> [Left most relevant parts of the letter]
>
> The logic of this letter (and sjw in general) is obviously false.
>
> 1. There are no examples where Stallman (or people with similar views) censored project contribution from non-white non-male people.
> In recent decades there is inflow of people from different counties and 2020 is definitely more diverse in programming than 2000 or 1980.
> This observation (absense of discrimiation) is the first important note which blows the login behind the letter.
>
> 2. Because the p1 is hard to refute, the discussion moves from objective things (for example, rejecting some pull request from people of color) toward subjective
> things like 'remove Stallman because I am not comfortable with his views/claims'. However, once this arguement is naked from the rest of discussion it becomes obviously weak.
> Why the project should remove Stallman because 'some' people are not comfortable? Why sjw consider themselves in the position to judge? What to do with the group of people who supports him?
> Finally, 'white priviledge' is only one (although  big) subject of dedates. What happens if other areas of social, political or economical debates are brought to the project? There are plenty of issues which divide people and there is no way to make the project to move of on if for each issue one group of people will demand removing members of comittee because of their views.
>
> 3. Most of claims about Stallman are not true (to be more precise - they are deliberately misrepresent what Stallman said to make his views to look immoral).
>
> 4. Regarding morality. This letter (like many other sjw creatures) says many words about morality, diversity, but at the end of the day it boils down to removing Stallman from position. As a citizen of post-soviet country I can vividly see that this letter is enterely about politics and looks very similar to communist agenda which likes to hide authoritarian policies behind morality. It is very surprising for people from former Soviet block countries to see western world falling into 'very familiar' but notorious propaganda.
>
> Best regards,
> Maxim Fomin
>
>

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Martin Jambor]

Dear Giacomo,

On Tue, Mar 30 2021, Giacomo Tesio wrote:
> On Tue, 30 Mar 2021 18:50:52 +0200 Martin Jambor wrote:
>
>> Unfortunately, all people are also able to close their eyes and ears
>> and ignore mistreatment when they are not the victims and when their
>> friend or their favorite public figure is the perpetrator.
>
> Martin, what you imply here, is an insult I do not deserve.

I am sorry.  I wanted to underline that the questions discussed here are
not cultural or somehow defined geographically.

> I do NOT ignore injustice or mistreatments whenever I see them and I
> fight them strongly through nonviolence. ALWAYS. 

Always?  OK, then you are clearly a much better person than I am.

> But in Italy we have a legal principle called "Presumption of innocence".

Nevertheless, I am convinced that all the many accusations are clear,
consistent and most of them are beyond any doubt (a lot of it is on
RMS's own blog).  They easily clear the bar for legitimate reasons why
he should not be an official representative of GCC.

I do not understand people which keep doubting the "evidence" or
describe it as hearsay, the only explanation I can think of is that they
simply do not wish to not accept the facts.  If you are certain that
this is not your case (no "proof" or explanation necessary) then please
accept my apologies.

Martin

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[JeanHeyd Meneide]

Dear Alfred and Alexandre,

     It seems that neither of you would like to offer any evidence
that counteracts what I have already been given by multiple
individuals. Furthermore,

Alexandre:
> A misguided person thought that reciprocating the doxxing against RMS
> was a good way to defend him.  It's not

Alfred:
> The claims about doxxing, etc, are entierly untrue and unfounded.

Either this happened, or it didn't. Alexandre says that some doxxing,
possibly in retaliation to original doxxing, occurred. Alfred says
everything is unfounded and untrue, point blank, no details. I do not
know which of you to believe, which mix is true, and at this point I
don't think I want to know because it's incredibly clear nobody wants
to be publicly clear about it, even after my offer to have the details
sent to me so I can have an informed opinion and not a piecemeal
understanding.

     Okay, fine.

     I support Nathan's inquiry.

Best of luck,
JeanHeyd

On Wed, Mar 31, 2021 at 3:14 AM Alfred M. Szmidt <ams@gnu.org> wrote:
>
> I ("new moderator") won't recount what happened, it is neither here,
> or there, but Mark is presenting a very biased view of what occured,
> and also one of the reasons why he no longer is a moderator.
>
> The claims about doxxing, etc, are entierly untrue and unfounded.

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Alfred M. Szmidt]

I ("new moderator") won't recount what happened, it is neither here,
or there, but Mark is presenting a very biased view of what occured,
and also one of the reasons why he no longer is a moderator.  

The claims about doxxing, etc, are entierly untrue and unfounded. 

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Alexandre Oliva]

On Mar 30, 2021, JeanHeyd Meneide <phdofthehouse@gmail.com> wrote:

>       Taking the correction into account

*nod*

> What you've presented here is your word ("This
> accusation is outright false, beyond any possible doubt."),

True, I didn't claim to be offering evidence, and that didn't seem
necessary since all the supporting evidence you'd brought was hearsay.
I can't link to the message that is presumably removed, and I suppose I
could get permission to share the email in which he issued the request,
but please be honest: would you believe it?

> they were NOT allowed to attack people like this and go this far and
> being banned by moderation, RMS taking explicit actions to UNDO that
> moderation and explicitly, in the internal mailing list, state
> (paraphrased): 'I have put a new moderator in. Have at it.'

This description suggests we're not even talking about the same events.
My description was about a doxxing web site/email posted no more than a
week ago.

Your description appears to resemble events of 2019: the illegitimate
censorious moderation that was imposed on a GNU mailing list, against
GNU and mailing list policies, after someone abused their autonomy to
grant moderation privileges to a group that started suppressing views
they disagreed with, while allowing personal attacks they supported to
go through.  List rules were restored and censorship ceased with the
legitimate installation of a larger group of moderators with more
diverse stances, that applied list rules and blocked inappropriate posts
while allowing through civil criticism on all sides.  Richard was
criticized for insisting on enabling the debate to carry on, but he
insisted on the principled stance of free speech, and then some, to
allow for what some perceived as personal attacks against him.


Now, you appear to believe a very different interpretation of these
facts.  I can't imagine that showing public posts will prove anything,
since the difference is in the interpretation and attribution of
motivations and allegiances, rather than on facts.  As law and history
have taught us, proving innocence or honesty are often impossible tasks;
it is the burden of the accuser to offer enough evidence to sustain an
accusation, and all you've brought is hearsay.  Popular, widespread
hateful hearsay, but still hearsay.


> where someone who was already banned

No such thing happened.  That's yet another distortion.

There was an attempt to attach shocking labels to an honest man.

The labels failed to stick, though some people still believe them.

Part of the problem is the reasoning that, if so many people are
parroting the same false allegations, there must be truth to them.

When any one of them is proven wrong, with the great effort required to
overcome preconceptions, the goal post is moved onto all of the others
that appear to remain, because the preconceptions still mistake them for
granted, and the accused remains guilty for having taken multiple shots.
That's not the way civilizations have long carried out justice.

-- 
Alexandre Oliva, happy hacker  https://FSFLA.org/blogs/lxo/
   Free Software Activist         GNU Toolchain Engineer
        Vim, Vi, Voltei pro Emacs -- GNUlius Caesar

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[JeanHeyd Meneide]

Dear Alexandre,

    As stated here, shortly after I sent my message
(https://gcc.gnu.org/pipermail/gcc/2021-March/235197.html):

> Apologies, a correction here. I should have more carefully read
> it, but this paragraph:
>
> >      My problem is Dr. Richard M. Stallman stands credibly and
> > factually accused of Doxxing and GCC contributor/participant and
> > knowingly manipulating the project for his own personal reasons.
>
>     This should be "RMS explicitly sanctioned, encouraged, and
> blessed the Doxxing of an individual". Apologies, he did not do the
> doxxing himself; this was a fat finger on my part. Please take that
> into account; the rest is accurate.

      Taking the correction into account, no, the accusation is not
even close to false. What you've presented here is your word ("This
accusation is outright false, beyond any possible doubt."), with a
shortened version of what happened and no evidence, and that does not
match the quoted responses from Stallman and other people who were
present in both the public mailing list discussion and the internal
mailing list. I was given quoted evidence of, after people being told
they were NOT allowed to attack people like this and go this far and
being banned by moderation, RMS taking explicit actions to UNDO that
moderation and explicitly, in the internal mailing list, state
(paraphrased): 'I have put a new moderator in. Have at it.'

     That the same individuals (who Stallman, again, explicitly and
knowingly) unshackled were then banned for continuing to do things
that were against the Community Guidelines and grossly inappropriate
(including the Doxxing). Stallman was not born yesterday, neither were
any of the moderators or contributors involved: Stallman deliberately
overturned moderator decisions and that decision went poorly after he
explicitly signaled to people that they should Go All Out.

     If you (or anyone else) have evidence to the contrary, logs,
screenshots, etc. that counteract what I know and I have already
received, then I would LOVE to be proven wrong and have ABSOLUTELY no
problem walking back every word I said and giving Richard M. Stallman
an apology and respect as well as apologizing to the mailing list for
believing to be led astray. If you feel the exact words should not be
shared publicly, you can e-mail me or message me privately; I have
honored everyone's right to privacy, and I will continue to do so.

     I must be explicitly clear here that the current body of evidence
gives me my current conviction. There is no planet, no galaxy, no
UNIVERSE, where someone who was already banned for going **way**
beyond acceptable behavior, and then brought back with their
punishment undone with the *explicit go-ahead to go forward* and a
*new moderator for that purpose*, would not take that as a signal to
be even nastier. If you are in a Leadership position and your thought
process here was "well, things will go better the second time" after
doing those actions, then you absolutely do not deserve to be in a
Leadership position, and you absolutely should not have stewardship
over me or my contributions. Especially if this is not your first time
on a mailing list and this is not your first time being a leader.

All my best,
JeanHeyd

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Alexandre Oliva]

On Mar 30, 2021, JeanHeyd Meneide via Gcc <gcc@gcc.gnu.org> wrote:

>      My problem is Dr. Richard M. Stallman stands credibly and
> factually accused of Doxxing and GCC contributor/participant and
> knowingly manipulating the project for his own personal reasons.

This accusation is outright false, beyond any possible doubt.


A misguided person thought that reciprocating the doxxing against RMS
was a good way to defend him.  It's not.

The message went through because there is no censorship regime in effect.

RMS asked the unacceptable post to be deleted from the archives hosted
in GNU servers as soon as he learned about it.

I did not check whether that was done.  If you have any evidence that it
wasn't, please let me know.


That you got confirmation of a false claim from multiple developers you
talked to should now have you doubting other of their allegations.

If you look into them outside the attacking coalition, you *will* find
them to be built on just as flaky foundations.


-- 
Alexandre Oliva, happy hacker  https://FSFLA.org/blogs/lxo/
   Free Software Activist         GNU Toolchain Engineer
        Vim, Vi, Voltei pro Emacs -- GNUlius Caesar

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Andrew Sutton]

Are you still responding to me? Your response reads like a thinly veiled
threat. Angry friends on a jihad? Sounds serious.

On Tue, Mar 30, 2021, 7:14 PM Christopher Dimech <dimech@gmx.com> wrote:

>
> I have some friends in this movement who have been getting rather angry
> recently.  There is a lot of anger in the world,
> in fact, in politics.  Our political movement is not the only one
> suffering from anger at the moment.  But some of my angry
> friends, have come to the conclusion that they’re on a jihad for free
> software.
>
> That way won’t work. If a campaign of coercive compliance is carried just
> a moment too far, willingness to use free
> software among rational people will decline to a point which is dangerous
> to freedom.
>
> ---------------------
> Christopher Dimech
> General Administrator - Naiad Informatics - GNU Project (Geocomputation)
> - Geophysical Simulation
> - Geological Subsurface Mapping
> - Disaster Preparedness and Mitigation
> - Natural Resource Exploration and Production
> - Free Software Advocacy
>
>
> *Sent:* Wednesday, March 31, 2021 at 9:55 AM
> *From:* "Andrew Sutton" <asutton.list@gmail.com>
> *To:* "Christopher Dimech" <dimech@gmx.com>
> *Cc:* "Joseph Myers" <joseph@codesourcery.com>, "GCC Development" <
> gcc@gcc.gnu.org>, "Nathan Sidwell" <nathan@acm.org>
> *Subject:* Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee
> Sorry for the confusion, but was this response directed to me? It seems
> entirely unrelated to what I wrote.
>
> On Tue, Mar 30, 2021, 5:35 PM Christopher Dimech <dimech@gmx.com> wrote:
>
>>
>> Seriously.  When you want something to happen within society, it is
>> complex.  Just
>> because you want to push something - an ideology - you chant about it
>> every day,
>> does not mean things will go your way.
>>
>> Perhaps you can start donating money to Antifa!
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> *Sent:* Wednesday, March 31, 2021 at 9:09 AM
>> *From:* "Andrew Sutton" <asutton.list@gmail.com>
>> *To:* "Christopher Dimech" <dimech@gmx.com>
>> *Cc:* "Joseph Myers" <joseph@codesourcery.com>, "GCC Development" <
>> gcc@gcc.gnu.org>, "Nathan Sidwell" <nathan@acm.org>
>> *Subject:* Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee
>> I guess I'll add my two cents. It seems everyone else is...
>>
>> I'm not a maintainer or frequent contributor, but I did implement
>> concepts for C++, and I'd like to continue contributing, time permitting.
>> My company (as in, I own it) also does some work on GCC, implementing new
>> and experimental features like contracts, which we intend to upstream,
>> pending review. Some modules-related stuff too (I hope).
>>
>> Maybe my response is a little different because I'm writing as a business
>> owner and not a contributor.
>>
>> </bona-fides>
>>
>> I understand that RMS is not actually on the steering committee and not
>> an active contributor, and the SC web page should be updated to reflect
>> that if it hasn't already.
>>
>> I agree with Nathan.
>>
>> The SC needs to be forward-looking --- you can't steer effectively if
>> you're always looking in the rear-view mirror. My understanding is that GCC
>> put RMS behind it a long time ago. And for the better.
>>
>> Part of the SC's job is (or should be) considering recruitment and
>> retention for this community, including corporate participation. This idea
>> that we have to somehow revere a person who has managed to make himself
>> controversial for reasons entirely unrelated to his ideology on free
>> software actively works against both of those goals.
>>
>> Undeniably so. If RMS were actually in the SC, I would have serious
>> reservations about committing my employees time to this community. His
>> documented behavior readily violates my company's code of conduct. At best,
>> I'd risk burn out employees in a toxic environment. At worst, I could end
>> up as a defendant in a sexual harassment case. And this 100% not hyperbole.
>>
>> (Thanks to everyone who makes GCC a good community to participate in.)
>>
>> I think it's perfectly reasonable for GCC to acknowledge RMS' past
>> contributions, both ideological and code-wise, but it's time to move on.
>> Nothing good comes from lionizing a man who purportedly asked teenage girls
>> to eat candy out of his hand.
>>
>>
>>
>> On Tue, Mar 30, 2021, 2:14 PM Christopher Dimech via Gcc <gcc@gcc.gnu.org>
>> wrote:
>>
>>>
>>> > Sent: Wednesday, March 31, 2021 at 5:45 AM
>>> > From: "Joseph Myers" <joseph@codesourcery.com>
>>> > To: "JeanHeyd Meneide" <phdofthehouse@gmail.com>
>>> > Cc: "GCC Development" <gcc@gcc.gnu.org>, "Nathan Sidwell" <
>>> nathan@acm.org>
>>> > Subject: Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee
>>> >
>>> > On Tue, 30 Mar 2021, JeanHeyd Meneide via Gcc wrote:
>>> >
>>> > >      So, it boils down to this for me: either GCC is a place where
>>> all
>>> > > contributions are welcome, or GCC is a place of hypocrisy, where
>>> > > contributions are welcome except when Stallman (or someone else in a
>>> > > position of power) lobbies a non-technical, non-factual argument
>>> > > against you and jumps from their high tower to slam down on
>>> > > rank-and-file contributors and participants. You cannot have it both
>>> > > ways.
>>> >
>>> > All contributions are welcome.  One of the key functions of the SC is
>>> > actually saying no to RMS.
>>> >
>>> > Central FSF or GNU project infrastructure is not used in developing
>>> GCC;
>>> > gcc.gnu.org is entirely independent of central FSF or GNU
>>> infrastructure
>>> > such as savannah.  So RMS has no control over policies applied to GCC
>>> > mailing lists, and any influence he might apply to the moderation of
>>> lists
>>> > hosted on lists.gnu.org does not apply here.  (Although GCC releases
>>> are
>>> > uploaded to ftp.gnu.org, which is central GNU infrastructure, they are
>>> > also available at https://gcc.gnu.org/pub/gcc/releases/ .)  He has an
>>> > ordinary restricted user account on gcc.gnu.org giving the same
>>> access to
>>> > push commits as most committers; he does not have shell or
>>> administrative
>>> > access.
>>>
>>> People are inflating the power or control he actually has.  I have to say
>>> that at no time has Stallman dictated on any of my work.  Unlike the
>>> animosity
>>> that has been demonstrated by Ludovic Courtès in October 2019, by sending
>>> a message disguised to look like an official Gnu Directive to Gnu
>>> Maintainers.
>>> A fashionable tool for excommunicating those he find problematic due to
>>> their
>>> pesky different points of view.
>>>
>>> > --
>>> > Joseph S. Myers
>>> > joseph@codesourcery.com
>>> >
>>
>>

Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Ville Voutilainen]

Giacomo wrote:
>Stallman cannot betray Free Software AND get away with it.
>So to me (and to many others) Stallman is a sort of a living warranty.

That's fine. He  doesn't need to be in the GCC SC to do that.
He can continue to provide guidance on the spirit of Free Software
without having an SC position, or any official leadership position.
The people in the GCC SC are very reasonable people; I have worked
with some of them, and they will listen to reasonable arguments.
RMS doesn't have veto powers anyway, and doesn't need them.

The proposed removal from the SC doesn't prevent RMS from
giving the aforementioned guidance in any way, nor does it even
make it any more difficult. In fact, that removal shouldn't have
any effect on his ability to give such guidance, nor does it actually
have any effect on what the consequences of his guidance will be.

The warranty you speak of does not boil down to a particular individual
being there in the SC. That's by RMS's own design; the copyright and the license
give you that warranty, not the SC presence of any single person.
And a removal from an SC doesn't equal the removal from the set
of people who can meaningfully contribute. That is certainly, I would
think, not the intent of anyone who has spoken in favor of the removal.

There is certainly a fair amount of heat in this discussion. Whether
the proposed removal has the effects it seeks, I don't know. But
I don't buy the surreptitious suggestions that the proposed removal
somehow spells doom for the continued availability of GCC as Free Software,
or for the spirit of Free Software in general. In my anecdotal case,
it doesn't. I have fairly good reasons to think that it doesn't spell such
doom for quite many other contributors to these projects, some far
more frequently active than me.

I am, Yours Most Sincerely,
Ville Voutilainen
an occasional libstdc++ contributor
a less-frequently occasional g++ contributor

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Joseph Myers]

On Tue, 30 Mar 2021, Giacomo Tesio wrote:

> That being said (and for full disclosure), I also consider his return to
> the FSF fair, because the shitstorm that caused his resign two years
> ago was built on top of a severe misrepresentation of his words, as
> described here https://jorgemorais.gitlab.io/justice-for-rms/ and
> admitted also by the people arguing against his return (see the
> various edits at https://rms-open-letter.github.io/appendix ).

I explicitly stated in my comments that my agreement with Nathan's 
conclusion is *not* based on the views RMS has expressed, whether on that 
occasion or on any other.

> But I'd want Stallman in GCC's SC for a totally different reason:
> 
> On Tue, 30 Mar 2021 18:50:52 +0200 Martin Jambor wrote:
> 
> > Nobody suggested that GCC would be relicensed and certainly not to a
> > non-free license.  If you decide to contribute your port upstream, it
> > will be safe with us, regardless of who will or will not be on the
> > steering committee

The GCC SC doesn't have the power to relicense GCC; that lies with the 
FSF.  We can correct clear licensing mistakes where the underlying 
licensing policy is already established (e.g. if someone forgets to put 
the runtime exception in a file in a target library) and there are certain 
cases with delegated relicensing powers (e.g. copying documentation for 
target hooks between GFDL and GPL files).  But in general relicensing 
depends on the FSF and that doesn't depend on who is on the SC.

(The original owner of code who assigned it to the FSF can also license 
copies of the code they contributed (not anyone else's changes to that 
code) under different licenses if they so wish, in accordance with the 
terms of the standard assignment agreements.  The standard assignment 
agreements also prevent the FSF from distributing the code under 
proprietary terms.)

> On Tue, 30 Mar 2021 17:45:24 +0000 Joseph Myers wrote:
> > One of the key functions of the SC is actually saying no to RMS.
> 
> My bad experiences with Google and SFC makes me ask: "about what?"

Any time he comes up with an idea, technical or otherwise, that doesn't 
make sense (he's too far removed from actually following GCC development 
or use to be able to judge that effectively himself).  If an idea makes 
sense, of course we'll let him know that we'll consider patches.  (It's 
only likely to be in very routine cases that someone on the SC just makes 
the requested change themselves, e.g. if he points out somewhere in the 
GCC documentation saying "Linux" that should be "GNU/Linux" in accordance 
with GNU conventions.)

-- 
Joseph S. Myers
joseph@codesourcery.com

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Giacomo Tesio]

Hi everybody, thanks for your feedbacks.

I've to say I'm a bit confused, but maybe we have different sources and
experience so we have different perspective on the matter.

Let's start with something I want to clarify:

On Tue, 30 Mar 2021 13:07:07 -0400 JeanHeyd Meneide wrote:

>  You state it here and many others say it throughout the thread
> that Stallman is the only reason they contribute to GCC, or similar
> Free Software projects. This deeply concerns me

I'm sorry, but apperently I was not clear.

I do NOT follow RMS as a prophet or something. He does NOT "lead" me.
We do not agree on several relevant political issues (even some
important one related to Free Software!) and I find statements like
https://stallman.org/notes/2016-jul-oct.html#31_October_2016_(Down's_syndrome)
plain disgusting.

So I'm NOT, in any way, a RMS fanboy.

That being said (and for full disclosure), I also consider his return to
the FSF fair, because the shitstorm that caused his resign two years
ago was built on top of a severe misrepresentation of his words, as
described here https://jorgemorais.gitlab.io/justice-for-rms/ and
admitted also by the people arguing against his return (see the
various edits at https://rms-open-letter.github.io/appendix ).


But I'd want Stallman in GCC's SC for a totally different reason:

On Tue, 30 Mar 2021 18:50:52 +0200 Martin Jambor wrote:

> Nobody suggested that GCC would be relicensed and certainly not to a
> non-free license.  If you decide to contribute your port upstream, it
> will be safe with us, regardless of who will or will not be on the
> steering committee

When I joined the Harvey project they were all fun and welcoming.
When I asked how and where to write my copyright statement, I was
answered by the seasoned and well known Google's engineer that a few
years later completely removed my name from the project without
removing the contributions.

Harvey is copylefted too (GPLv2) and as you know, this sort of
behaviour would trigger GPL termination, but Harvey is part of
Software Freedom Conservancy and the violation of my copyright
likely occurred during the working hours of the above engineer.

So they were the good guys and the most powerful guys, together.
I had no hope in a US court (and I'm Italian and... let say "not rich").


They taught me a valuable lesson, though.

In the long run, even the good guys betray your trust if they have a
reason to and they think they can get away with that.


Stallman cannot betray Free Software AND get away with it.

So to me (and to many others) Stallman is a sort of a living warranty.

Unless, obviously, you have reasons that I ignore to not trust him on
his loyalty to the Free Software vision and movement. Do you have any?

For example when I read

On Tue, 30 Mar 2021 17:45:24 +0000 Joseph Myers wrote:
> One of the key functions of the SC is actually saying no to RMS.

My bad experiences with Google and SFC makes me ask: "about what?"


So if you (all) have good reason to think that RMS could betray
Free Software, well... THAT would be a good argument to put on the
table!


But note that to many of us, GCC is not just a great compiler suite!
More importantly, it's a Free Software compiler suite.

This means that its core value, its main "selling point", is not how
cool it is, but how it is designed, developed and distributed to
maximise software freedom.

IOW, I can imagine scenarios where some features should NOT be
introduced to reach this political goal which is MORE important
than the technical goal of compiler suite

To this aim, I'd prefer to see RMS in the GCC's SC.
Because to me GCC is not just "open source", it's not just matter of
seeing the source: it's Free Software, it should be designed and
developed TO maximize software freedom!

That's a fundamental difference that still stay between Free Software
and Open Source.


On Tue, 30 Mar 2021 18:56:02 +0200 Markus Böck wrote:

> At least I would hope that most countries are in pursuit
> or see value in having an inclusive environment where no one has to
> feel treated unfairly due to either their gender, race or other
> things.

I want to clarify that I hope this too. Really. 
And in fact thousands of people of very different races and genders
worldwide expressed their support for RMS and FSF by signing
https://rms-support-letter.github.io/
Some of them are my close friends, but I will not, obviously, doxe them.

However you can find very variegate people arguing on the web for RMS
from all of genders and races. Just a few valuable examples are 
Leah Rowe https://mobile.twitter.com/n4of7/status/1374844604101591047 and
Mary Kate Fain https://mobile.twitter.com/mkay_fain/status/1374766567544737793


On Tue, 30 Mar 2021 18:56:02 +0200 Markus Böck wrote:

> I am also of the opinion that legally wrong does not equal morally
> wrong. RMS does not have to have committed a crime for the developers
> of GCC, the SC or whoever, to feel like he is not representing their
> values as a member of the SC well.

This is the point, I think.

__In the context of software development__ RMS actually REPRESENT me.

And many other. We do not have to LIKE him.

But we trust HIM, on this regards.


Giacomo


Post Scripta

On Tue, 30 Mar 2021 18:50:52 +0200 Martin Jambor wrote:

> Unfortunately, all people are also able to close their eyes and ears
> and ignore mistreatment when they are not the victims and when their
> friend or their favorite public figure is the perpetrator.

Martin, what you imply here, is an insult I do not deserve.

I do NOT ignore injustice or mistreatments whenever I see them and I
fight them strongly through nonviolence. ALWAYS. 

But in Italy we have a legal principle called "Presumption of innocence".
It's a principle sadly abused by criminals, but it stands
because otherwise, the same criminals would abuse Law (and Power)
against the weakest.


On Tue, 30 Mar 2021 14:09:26 -0400 JeanHeyd Meneide wrote:

> >      My problem is Dr. Richard M. Stallman stands credibly and
> > factually accused of Doxxing and GCC contributor/participant and
> > knowingly manipulating the project for his own personal reasons.  
> 
> This should be "RMS explicitly sanctioned, encouraged, and
> blessed the Doxxing of an individual". Apologies, he did not do the
> doxxing himself; this was a fat finger on my part. 

Thanks for the clarification. I was quite surprised actually, because
I didn't read such accuse among the others in the rms-open-letter.

Did it happen on a public mailing list I can read?
Or maybe in a public forum? Or something that has been published
somewhere?

Don't get me wrong but I saw so much slanders and lies about Stallman
in the last two years that I prefer to double check primary sources to
form an opinion. 

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Ian Lance Taylor]

I encourage everyone to please try to keep this discussion focused on GCC.

If there is a message that is completely unrelated to GCC, I encourage
not responding, or responding off-list.

Thanks.

Ian

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Gabriel Ravier]

On 3/30/21 7:10 PM, Christopher Dimech via Gcc wrote:
>> Sent: Wednesday, March 31, 2021 at 4:50 AM
>> From: "Martin Jambor" <mjambor@suse.cz>
>> To: "Giacomo Tesio" <giacomo@tesio.it>
>> Cc: "GCC Development" <gcc@gcc.gnu.org>
>> Subject: Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee
>>
>> Dear Giacomo,
>>
>> On Tue, Mar 30 2021, Giacomo Tesio wrote:
>>> Hi Nathan and hello everybody,
>>>
>>> On Fri, 26 Mar 2021 16:02:30 -0400 Nathan Sidwell wrote:
>>>
>>>> The USA is not the world and the SC is not the US government.  For
>>>> those in the USA, the (inapplicable) first amendment provides 5
>>>> rights, including showing an unwelcome guest the door. [...]
>>>>
>>>> If we fail to do so, it will continue to be harder and harder to
>>>> attract new talent to GCC development.
>>> I do not know if I qualify to speak here because I'm Italian and
>>> I ported GCC 9.2.0 to Jehanne (a Plan 9 fork, see
>>> http://jehanne.io/2021/01/06/gcc_on_jehanne.html), but due to the
>>> pandemic I wasn't able to align it with the new developments and
>>> contribute the port upstream. Also, I have no idea if you would be
>>> interested in running GCC on a Plan 9 fork and thus accept my
>>> contribution.
>>>
>>>
>>> Yet, after a careful read of this thread I realized that I might
>>> be considered the kind of "new talent" Nathan is talking about.
>>>
>>> So here is my perspective on this topic, "in the hope it helps but
>>> without any warranty". :-D
>>>
>>>
>>> I do not share many of Stallman's opinions (we are VERY different), but
>>> when I write free software and contribute to a free software community,
>>> what I want is long term assurances about one and only one topic: that
>>> the software will stay free as in freedom, as a common good for the
>>> whole humanity.
>>>
>>> As of today, GPLv3 is the legal tool that best suit this goal.
>>> I don't think it's perfect in this regards, but that's another story.
>> Nobody suggested that GCC would be relicensed and certainly not to a
>> non-free license.  If you decide to contribute your port upstream, it
>> will be safe with us, regardless of who will or will not be on the
>> steering committee or running the FSF.  Just read the copyright
>> assignment text that you have singed or would need to sign to contribute
>> and look for FSF obligations as the license holder there.
>>
>>> As an Italian I'm having a hard time trying to follow your reasoning
>>> about Stallman being a problem to attract new talents.
>> I do not believe that being European or Italian has anything to do with
>> it. I am European, I understand and agree with everything Nathan wrote
>> and apparently I am not the only one.
>>
>> The ability to see and stand up to consistent wrongdoing is universal
>> and every human of every nationality posses it.  Unfortunately, all
>> people are also able to close their eyes and ears and ignore mistreatment
>> when they are not the victims and when their friend or their favorite
>> public figure is the perpetrator.  There is absolutely nothing American
>> or European about either.
> Young socialists have been getting organized on colleges campuses
> with these extreme ideas not only in the United States.  France, for
> instance has been harbouring a socialist model we should all dread.
>
> France was once a role model for what big government can do for its
> people. But it has become an embarrassing example since “The Gilets
> Jaunes” took to the streets to demonstrate against the insane amount
> of taxes they pay. These guys aren’t upper class. They are the people
> who had supported the policies that are inevitable when you have the
> government providing so many services and involved so deeply in so much
> of the economy.
>
> All those people in America who currently fall for the socialism soup
> that that Ocasio-Cortez and Sanders are selling need to realize that if
> their dream came to pass, they, not the rich – not the bankers and politicians
> – will be ones suffering the most from the high taxes, high unemployment, and
> slow growth that go hand in hand with the level of public spending they want.
I fail to see how this has anything to do with the message you're 
answering. Is this what the right-wingers in America are resorting to ? 
Randomly making speeches about the "socialist soup" whenever they 
encounter something they can't find a good answer to ?
>> Sincerely,
>>
>> Martin
>>

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Christopher Dimech]

> Sent: Wednesday, March 31, 2021 at 5:45 AM
> From: "Joseph Myers" <joseph@codesourcery.com>
> To: "JeanHeyd Meneide" <phdofthehouse@gmail.com>
> Cc: "GCC Development" <gcc@gcc.gnu.org>, "Nathan Sidwell" <nathan@acm.org>
> Subject: Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee
>
> On Tue, 30 Mar 2021, JeanHeyd Meneide via Gcc wrote:
> 
> >      So, it boils down to this for me: either GCC is a place where all
> > contributions are welcome, or GCC is a place of hypocrisy, where
> > contributions are welcome except when Stallman (or someone else in a
> > position of power) lobbies a non-technical, non-factual argument
> > against you and jumps from their high tower to slam down on
> > rank-and-file contributors and participants. You cannot have it both
> > ways.
> 
> All contributions are welcome.  One of the key functions of the SC is 
> actually saying no to RMS.
> 
> Central FSF or GNU project infrastructure is not used in developing GCC; 
> gcc.gnu.org is entirely independent of central FSF or GNU infrastructure 
> such as savannah.  So RMS has no control over policies applied to GCC 
> mailing lists, and any influence he might apply to the moderation of lists 
> hosted on lists.gnu.org does not apply here.  (Although GCC releases are 
> uploaded to ftp.gnu.org, which is central GNU infrastructure, they are 
> also available at https://gcc.gnu.org/pub/gcc/releases/ .)  He has an 
> ordinary restricted user account on gcc.gnu.org giving the same access to 
> push commits as most committers; he does not have shell or administrative 
> access.

People are inflating the power or control he actually has.  I have to say
that at no time has Stallman dictated on any of my work.  Unlike the animosity
that has been demonstrated by Ludovic Courtès in October 2019, by sending
a message disguised to look like an official Gnu Directive to Gnu Maintainers.
A fashionable tool for excommunicating those he find problematic due to their
pesky different points of view.   
 
> -- 
> Joseph S. Myers
> joseph@codesourcery.com
>

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[JeanHeyd Meneide]

Dear Giacomo,

     Apologies, a correction here. I should have more carefully read
it, but this paragraph:

>      My problem is Dr. Richard M. Stallman stands credibly and
> factually accused of Doxxing and GCC contributor/participant and
> knowingly manipulating the project for his own personal reasons.

     This should be "RMS explicitly sanctioned, encouraged, and
blessed the Doxxing of an individual". Apologies, he did not do the
doxxing himself; this was a fat finger on my part. Please take that
into account; the rest is accurate.

Sincerely,
JeanHeyd

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Joseph Myers]

On Tue, 30 Mar 2021, JeanHeyd Meneide via Gcc wrote:

>      So, it boils down to this for me: either GCC is a place where all
> contributions are welcome, or GCC is a place of hypocrisy, where
> contributions are welcome except when Stallman (or someone else in a
> position of power) lobbies a non-technical, non-factual argument
> against you and jumps from their high tower to slam down on
> rank-and-file contributors and participants. You cannot have it both
> ways.

All contributions are welcome.  One of the key functions of the SC is 
actually saying no to RMS.

Central FSF or GNU project infrastructure is not used in developing GCC; 
gcc.gnu.org is entirely independent of central FSF or GNU infrastructure 
such as savannah.  So RMS has no control over policies applied to GCC 
mailing lists, and any influence he might apply to the moderation of lists 
hosted on lists.gnu.org does not apply here.  (Although GCC releases are 
uploaded to ftp.gnu.org, which is central GNU infrastructure, they are 
also available at https://gcc.gnu.org/pub/gcc/releases/ .)  He has an 
ordinary restricted user account on gcc.gnu.org giving the same access to 
push commits as most committers; he does not have shell or administrative 
access.

-- 
Joseph S. Myers
joseph@codesourcery.com

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Christopher Dimech]

> Sent: Wednesday, March 31, 2021 at 4:50 AM
> From: "Martin Jambor" <mjambor@suse.cz>
> To: "Giacomo Tesio" <giacomo@tesio.it>
> Cc: "GCC Development" <gcc@gcc.gnu.org>
> Subject: Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee
>
> Dear Giacomo,
> 
> On Tue, Mar 30 2021, Giacomo Tesio wrote:
> > Hi Nathan and hello everybody,
> >
> > On Fri, 26 Mar 2021 16:02:30 -0400 Nathan Sidwell wrote:
> >
> >> The USA is not the world and the SC is not the US government.  For
> >> those in the USA, the (inapplicable) first amendment provides 5
> >> rights, including showing an unwelcome guest the door. [...]
> >>
> >> If we fail to do so, it will continue to be harder and harder to
> >> attract new talent to GCC development.
> >
> > I do not know if I qualify to speak here because I'm Italian and
> > I ported GCC 9.2.0 to Jehanne (a Plan 9 fork, see
> > http://jehanne.io/2021/01/06/gcc_on_jehanne.html), but due to the
> > pandemic I wasn't able to align it with the new developments and
> > contribute the port upstream. Also, I have no idea if you would be
> > interested in running GCC on a Plan 9 fork and thus accept my
> > contribution.
> >
> >
> > Yet, after a careful read of this thread I realized that I might
> > be considered the kind of "new talent" Nathan is talking about.
> >
> > So here is my perspective on this topic, "in the hope it helps but
> > without any warranty". :-D
> >
> >
> > I do not share many of Stallman's opinions (we are VERY different), but
> > when I write free software and contribute to a free software community,
> > what I want is long term assurances about one and only one topic: that
> > the software will stay free as in freedom, as a common good for the
> > whole humanity.
> >
> > As of today, GPLv3 is the legal tool that best suit this goal.
> > I don't think it's perfect in this regards, but that's another story.
> 
> Nobody suggested that GCC would be relicensed and certainly not to a
> non-free license.  If you decide to contribute your port upstream, it
> will be safe with us, regardless of who will or will not be on the
> steering committee or running the FSF.  Just read the copyright
> assignment text that you have singed or would need to sign to contribute
> and look for FSF obligations as the license holder there.
> 
> > As an Italian I'm having a hard time trying to follow your reasoning
> > about Stallman being a problem to attract new talents.
> 
> I do not believe that being European or Italian has anything to do with
> it. I am European, I understand and agree with everything Nathan wrote
> and apparently I am not the only one.
> 
> The ability to see and stand up to consistent wrongdoing is universal
> and every human of every nationality posses it.  Unfortunately, all
> people are also able to close their eyes and ears and ignore mistreatment
> when they are not the victims and when their friend or their favorite
> public figure is the perpetrator.  There is absolutely nothing American
> or European about either.

Young socialists have been getting organized on colleges campuses 
with these extreme ideas not only in the United States.  France, for
instance has been harbouring a socialist model we should all dread.

France was once a role model for what big government can do for its
people. But it has become an embarrassing example since “The Gilets
Jaunes” took to the streets to demonstrate against the insane amount
of taxes they pay. These guys aren’t upper class. They are the people
who had supported the policies that are inevitable when you have the
government providing so many services and involved so deeply in so much
of the economy.

All those people in America who currently fall for the socialism soup
that that Ocasio-Cortez and Sanders are selling need to realize that if
their dream came to pass, they, not the rich – not the bankers and politicians
– will be ones suffering the most from the high taxes, high unemployment, and
slow growth that go hand in hand with the level of public spending they want.

> Sincerely,
> 
> Martin
>

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[JeanHeyd Meneide]

Dear Giacomo,

     I want to reply specifically to you because you, like me, are a
new contributor, and I have a few questions and a few points that I
think are salient in this discussion.

> As an Italian I'm having a hard time trying to follow your reasoning
> about Stallman being a problem to attract new talents.
>
> I could understand such statement if he had committed actual crimes,
> was legally persecuted, processed and condemned like Reiser.
>
> But while I try, I cannot really understand why you think that his name
> in the Steering Committee would drive away people from contributing GCC

     The first is that I don't want to get into the conversation about
how the FSF handles Stallman. Other than them having my Copyright
assignment (something I also need to take a look at), the FSF does not
write the code. GCC's contributors, like you and me, do. My biggest
problem with Stallman right now is not about whether or not he likes
US-ians or if he's a good person:

     My problem is Dr. Richard M. Stallman stands credibly and
factually accused of Doxxing and GCC contributor/participant and
knowingly manipulating the project for his own personal reasons.

     When I say this, I want to be clear: when Mark sent his e-mail I
followed up with multiple GCC contributors to determine how factual
his claim actually was. Multiple people have independently
corroborated that Stallman did what Mark said, and worse, and their
quotes of Stallman's words line up word-for-word. In fact, what
Stallman did was worse than what Mark described, and has happened
multiple times before. Stallman is willing to attack and engage in
cancel culture of his own contributors. What his reasons are, I don't
know and I do not want to know: my bottom line here is that Stallman
is a danger to GCC contributors and is harmful to them.

     I make no argument based on my ethnicity, skin color, which side
of the globe I come from. Dr. Stallman's demonstrated behavior is that
he can - and WILL, and HAS - shown up into places where he has very
little to offer technically and utterly derailed or otherwise harmed
individuals or peoples **and their code contributions**.

     So, it boils down to this for me: either GCC is a place where all
contributions are welcome, or GCC is a place of hypocrisy, where
contributions are welcome except when Stallman (or someone else in a
position of power) lobbies a non-technical, non-factual argument
against you and jumps from their high tower to slam down on
rank-and-file contributors and participants. You cannot have it both
ways.

      That is why I switched from "wait and see" to "absolutely not".
I am not going to wait for the day somebody high up enough on the GCC
ladder doesn't like me enough to decide that he's going to
shoulder-slam my contributions with non-technical claptrap, nor am I
going to recommend other people to this project if anyone can do that
to them. Which brings me to another important point...

> I do not really know if the removing Stallman from the Steering
> Committee would attract more US people in GCC development. Or if it
> would attract more US people that now prefer to work in LLVM only
> because of they feel somehow bad working with Stallman in the SC.
>
>
> But I can assure you that, as Pankaj Jangid said before me, many many
> people are attracted to GCC, as users and developers, BECAUSE of
> Stallman presence, because they know that something like this
> https://medium.com/@giacomo_59737/what-i-wish-i-knew-before-contributing-to-open-source-dd63acd20696
> will not happen to them.
>
>
> World wide, people do not LIKE Stallman, but we TRUST him on this.
> Just like the GPLv3, RMS is not perfect, but it does ONE THING well.

     You state it here and many others say it throughout the thread
that Stallman is the only reason they contribute to GCC, or similar
Free Software projects. This deeply concerns me, because the
underlying implication is if that Stallman were to disappear, right
this second, all of you would be gone. Yet, on the other hand, we say
that this is the "Free Software MOVEMENT". A movement cannot be
destroyed because one person disappears; if that is the case, it is
not a movement, but a ring of personality around an individual. Either
this is a Free Software Movement, or this is Stallman's Free Software
Shindig. I contribute to GCC because I expect that when Stallman is
gone and I am Stallman's age, there will still be a Free Software
Movement. Stewarded by the FSF or the CNCF or the {insert gathering of
like-minded OSS contributors and enthusiasts and hard workers here}.

     Is this not the case for you and others?

     If Stallman is the only thing holding this movement together, I
would like to know this now so I can invest my time in an actual
movement elsewhere, independently of whether or not he remains on the
Steering Committee. (I still believe he has no place to have a
position of power on the Steering Committee, and instead should just
be a normal contributor, like everyone else, because he has proven he
is irresponsible and dangerous with such power.)

Sincerely,
JeanHeyd

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Markus Böck]

Hello Giacomo and everyone else!

As a neighbour to your north (Austria), and another potential
newcomer, I would also like to point out that I do not believe the
views given by Nathan and others in support of him are very
US-centric. At least I would hope that most countries are in pursuit
or see value in having an inclusive environment where no one has to
feel treated unfairly due to either their gender, race or other
things. For what it's worth, Nathan may have simply picked the USA as
an example due familiarity. We don't know that.
As far as I am aware many of the people who have been participating in
this thread are also not from the USA.

I am also of the opinion that legally wrong does not equal morally
wrong. RMS does not have to have committed a crime for the developers
of GCC, the SC or whoever, to feel like he is not representing their
values as a member of the SC well.

Best regards
Markus

On Tue, Mar 30, 2021 at 3:20 PM Giacomo Tesio <giacomo@tesio.it> wrote:
>
> Hi Nathan and hello everybody,
>
> On Fri, 26 Mar 2021 16:02:30 -0400 Nathan Sidwell wrote:
>
> > The USA is not the world and the SC is not the US government.  For
> > those in the USA, the (inapplicable) first amendment provides 5
> > rights, including showing an unwelcome guest the door. [...]
> >
> > If we fail to do so, it will continue to be harder and harder to
> > attract new talent to GCC development.
>
> I do not know if I qualify to speak here because I'm Italian and
> I ported GCC 9.2.0 to Jehanne (a Plan 9 fork, see
> http://jehanne.io/2021/01/06/gcc_on_jehanne.html), but due to the
> pandemic I wasn't able to align it with the new developments and
> contribute the port upstream. Also, I have no idea if you would be
> interested in running GCC on a Plan 9 fork and thus accept my
> contribution.
>
>
> Yet, after a careful read of this thread I realized that I might
> be considered the kind of "new talent" Nathan is talking about.
>
> So here is my perspective on this topic, "in the hope it helps but
> without any warranty". :-D
>
>
> I do not share many of Stallman's opinions (we are VERY different), but
> when I write free software and contribute to a free software community,
> what I want is long term assurances about one and only one topic: that
> the software will stay free as in freedom, as a common good for the
> whole humanity.
>
> As of today, GPLv3 is the legal tool that best suit this goal.
> I don't think it's perfect in this regards, but that's another story.
>
>
> As an Italian I'm having a hard time trying to follow your reasoning
> about Stallman being a problem to attract new talents.
>
> I could understand such statement if he had committed actual crimes,
> was legally persecuted, processed and condemned like Reiser.
>
> But while I try, I cannot really understand why you think that his name
> in the Steering Committee would drive away people from contributing GCC
>
>
> I ported GCC to Plan 9 because I want a free compiler suite for my OS.
>
> Porting CLANG would have been easier (to some extent) BUT my choice was
> political and Stallman in the Steering Committee is a long term
> warranty that GCC development will not steer away from the Free
> Software conception that I know, betraying my trust.
>
>
> My impression is that you are, in absolute good faith, projecting your
> own culture (quite US-centric, as far as I can deduce by this thread)
> to the whole world.
>
>
> I do not really know if the removing Stallman from the Steering
> Committee would attract more US people in GCC development. Or if it
> would attract more US people that now prefer to work in LLVM only
> because of they feel somehow bad working with Stallman in the SC.
>
>
> But I can assure you that, as Pankaj Jangid said before me, many many
> people are attracted to GCC, as users and developers, BECAUSE of
> Stallman presence, because they know that something like this
> https://medium.com/@giacomo_59737/what-i-wish-i-knew-before-contributing-to-open-source-dd63acd20696
> will not happen to them.
>
>
> World wide, people do not LIKE Stallman, but we TRUST him on this.
> Just like the GPLv3, RMS is not perfect, but it does ONE THING well.
>
>
> So, since you care about demographics, please consider that.
>
> Removing RMS you might attract more of certain US demographics,
> but you will certainly alienate a lot of people world wide that
> do not align your political values (despite respecting them a lot!)
> and do not think that a compiler suite can fix US systemic issues
> anyway.
>
>
> As for me, I would NOT trust GCC (or FSF) in the long term, had
> you to distance Stallman, because I've already seen with my eyes
> what happen when people do not have anything to loose to betray your
> trust, and Stallman has all to lose by betraying Free Software.
>
>
> Maybe I'm not the "new talent" you are looking for.
>
> But please, do not turn GCC into a US-centric project.
>
>
>
> Giacomo

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Martin Jambor]

Dear Giacomo,

On Tue, Mar 30 2021, Giacomo Tesio wrote:
> Hi Nathan and hello everybody,
>
> On Fri, 26 Mar 2021 16:02:30 -0400 Nathan Sidwell wrote:
>
>> The USA is not the world and the SC is not the US government.  For
>> those in the USA, the (inapplicable) first amendment provides 5
>> rights, including showing an unwelcome guest the door. [...]
>>
>> If we fail to do so, it will continue to be harder and harder to
>> attract new talent to GCC development.
>
> I do not know if I qualify to speak here because I'm Italian and
> I ported GCC 9.2.0 to Jehanne (a Plan 9 fork, see
> http://jehanne.io/2021/01/06/gcc_on_jehanne.html), but due to the
> pandemic I wasn't able to align it with the new developments and
> contribute the port upstream. Also, I have no idea if you would be
> interested in running GCC on a Plan 9 fork and thus accept my
> contribution.
>
>
> Yet, after a careful read of this thread I realized that I might
> be considered the kind of "new talent" Nathan is talking about.
>
> So here is my perspective on this topic, "in the hope it helps but
> without any warranty". :-D
>
>
> I do not share many of Stallman's opinions (we are VERY different), but
> when I write free software and contribute to a free software community,
> what I want is long term assurances about one and only one topic: that
> the software will stay free as in freedom, as a common good for the
> whole humanity.
>
> As of today, GPLv3 is the legal tool that best suit this goal.
> I don't think it's perfect in this regards, but that's another story.

Nobody suggested that GCC would be relicensed and certainly not to a
non-free license.  If you decide to contribute your port upstream, it
will be safe with us, regardless of who will or will not be on the
steering committee or running the FSF.  Just read the copyright
assignment text that you have singed or would need to sign to contribute
and look for FSF obligations as the license holder there.

> As an Italian I'm having a hard time trying to follow your reasoning
> about Stallman being a problem to attract new talents.

I do not believe that being European or Italian has anything to do with
it. I am European, I understand and agree with everything Nathan wrote
and apparently I am not the only one.

The ability to see and stand up to consistent wrongdoing is universal
and every human of every nationality posses it.  Unfortunately, all
people are also able to close their eyes and ears and ignore mistreatment
when they are not the victims and when their friend or their favorite
public figure is the perpetrator.  There is absolutely nothing American
or European about either.

Sincerely,

Martin

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Richard Kenner]

> 3. Most of claims about Stallman are not true (to be more precise -
> they are deliberately misrepresent what Stallman said to make his
> views to look immoral).

I would like to suggest that this discussion will go better without
making accusations that people are "deliberately" doing something.  In
my opinion, there are many different ways both of interpreting what
somebody writes and in making value judgements on the appropriateness
of saying something in a certain way.

Just because you and somebody else interpret a statement in different
ways or have different moral views of the propriety of saying
something in a certain way doesn't mean that either of you are
"deliberately misrepresting" anything.

Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Maksim Fomin]

‐‐‐‐‐‐‐ Original Message ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐
On Friday, 26 March 2021 г., 23:02, Nathan Sidwell <nathan@acm.org> wrote:

> I would rather not have to write this email. Like many developers, I just want
> to write code. Right now we’re working towards the GCC 11 release. I thought
> about deferring this email. But there’s never a good time, and bad behaviour
> needs to be addressed in the moment. I have left this for too long already.
>
> I used to think of GCC development as egalitarian, and therefore fair, and, by
> assumption, welcoming. That is not true. I’m a white dude with a British accent.
> /Of course/ I have white male privilege. I used to joke that I fell into every
> job I’ve had (including my doctorate) – that, right there, is white male
> privilege.
>
> Perhaps you discount the benefits of white male privilege. You’re wrong.
>
> You cannot have missed the sparsity of women and people of color in compiler
> engineering (kaporcenter black tech workforce). Maybe you fallaciously put that
> down to imbalances in education (leakytechpipeline) How can we, the GCC
> community, be expected to address that? Representation matters, we’re the problem.

[Left most relevant parts of the letter]

The logic of this letter (and sjw in general) is obviously false.

1. There are no examples where Stallman (or people with similar views) censored project contribution from non-white non-male people.
In recent decades there is inflow of people from different counties and 2020 is definitely more diverse in programming than 2000 or 1980.
This observation (absense of discrimiation) is the first important note which blows the login behind the letter.

2. Because the p1 is hard to refute, the discussion moves from objective things (for example, rejecting some pull request from people of color) toward subjective
things like 'remove Stallman because I am not comfortable with his views/claims'. However, once this arguement is naked from the rest of discussion it becomes obviously weak.
Why the project should remove Stallman because 'some' people are not comfortable? Why sjw consider themselves in the position to judge? What to do with the group of people who supports him?
Finally, 'white priviledge' is only one (although  big) subject of dedates. What happens if other areas of social, political or economical debates are brought to the project? There are plenty of issues which divide people and there is no way to make the project to move of on if for each issue one group of people will demand removing members of comittee because of their views.

3. Most of claims about Stallman are not true (to be more precise - they are deliberately misrepresent what Stallman said to make his views to look immoral).

4. Regarding morality. This letter (like many other sjw creatures) says many words about morality, diversity, but at the end of the day it boils down to removing Stallman from position. As a citizen of post-soviet country I can vividly see that this letter is enterely about politics and looks very similar to communist agenda which likes to hide authoritarian policies behind morality. It is very surprising for people from former Soviet block countries to see western world falling into 'very familiar' but notorious propaganda.

Best regards,
Maxim Fomin

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Christopher Dimech]

> Sent: Wednesday, March 31, 2021 at 1:16 AM
> From: "Giacomo Tesio" <giacomo@tesio.it>
> To: "Nathan Sidwell" <nathan@acm.org>
> Cc: "GCC Development" <gcc@gcc.gnu.org>
> Subject: Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee
>
> Hi Nathan and hello everybody,
>
> On Fri, 26 Mar 2021 16:02:30 -0400 Nathan Sidwell wrote:
>
> > The USA is not the world and the SC is not the US government.  For
> > those in the USA, the (inapplicable) first amendment provides 5
> > rights, including showing an unwelcome guest the door. [...]
> >
> > If we fail to do so, it will continue to be harder and harder to
> > attract new talent to GCC development.
>
> I do not know if I qualify to speak here because I'm Italian and
> I ported GCC 9.2.0 to Jehanne (a Plan 9 fork, see
> http://jehanne.io/2021/01/06/gcc_on_jehanne.html), but due to the
> pandemic I wasn't able to align it with the new developments and
> contribute the port upstream. Also, I have no idea if you would be
> interested in running GCC on a Plan 9 fork and thus accept my
> contribution.
>
>
> Yet, after a careful read of this thread I realized that I might
> be considered the kind of "new talent" Nathan is talking about.
>
> So here is my perspective on this topic, "in the hope it helps but
> without any warranty". :-D
>
>
> I do not share many of Stallman's opinions (we are VERY different), but
> when I write free software and contribute to a free software community,
> what I want is long term assurances about one and only one topic: that
> the software will stay free as in freedom, as a common good for the
> whole humanity.
>
> As of today, GPLv3 is the legal tool that best suit this goal.
> I don't think it's perfect in this regards, but that's another story.
>
>
> As an Italian I'm having a hard time trying to follow your reasoning
> about Stallman being a problem to attract new talents.
>
> I could understand such statement if he had committed actual crimes,
> was legally persecuted, processed and condemned like Reiser.
>
> But while I try, I cannot really understand why you think that his name
> in the Steering Committee would drive away people from contributing GCC
>
>
> I ported GCC to Plan 9 because I want a free compiler suite for my OS.
>
> Porting CLANG would have been easier (to some extent) BUT my choice was
> political and Stallman in the Steering Committee is a long term
> warranty that GCC development will not steer away from the Free
> Software conception that I know, betraying my trust.
>
>
> My impression is that you are, in absolute good faith, projecting your
> own culture (quite US-centric, as far as I can deduce by this thread)
> to the whole world.

Correct.  Very good evaluation.

> I do not really know if the removing Stallman from the Steering
> Committee would attract more US people in GCC development. Or if it
> would attract more US people that now prefer to work in LLVM only
> because of they feel somehow bad working with Stallman in the SC.
>
>
> But I can assure you that, as Pankaj Jangid said before me, many many
> people are attracted to GCC, as users and developers, BECAUSE of
> Stallman presence, because they know that something like this
> https://medium.com/@giacomo_59737/what-i-wish-i-knew-before-contributing-to-open-source-dd63acd20696
> will not happen to them.
>
>
> World wide, people do not LIKE Stallman, but we TRUST him on this.
> Just like the GPLv3, RMS is not perfect, but it does ONE THING well.
>
>
> So, since you care about demographics, please consider that.
>
> Removing RMS you might attract more of certain US demographics,
> but you will certainly alienate a lot of people world wide that
> do not align your political values (despite respecting them a lot!)
> and do not think that a compiler suite can fix US systemic issues
> anyway.
>
>
> As for me, I would NOT trust GCC (or FSF) in the long term, had
> you to distance Stallman, because I've already seen with my eyes
> what happen when people do not have anything to loose to betray your
> trust, and Stallman has all to lose by betraying Free Software.
>
>
> Maybe I'm not the "new talent" you are looking for.

The Gnu Project looks for all kind of talent.

> But please, do not turn GCC into a US-centric project.


> Giacomo

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Giacomo Tesio]

Hi Nathan and hello everybody,

On Fri, 26 Mar 2021 16:02:30 -0400 Nathan Sidwell wrote:

> The USA is not the world and the SC is not the US government.  For
> those in the USA, the (inapplicable) first amendment provides 5
> rights, including showing an unwelcome guest the door. [...]
>
> If we fail to do so, it will continue to be harder and harder to
> attract new talent to GCC development.

I do not know if I qualify to speak here because I'm Italian and
I ported GCC 9.2.0 to Jehanne (a Plan 9 fork, see
http://jehanne.io/2021/01/06/gcc_on_jehanne.html), but due to the
pandemic I wasn't able to align it with the new developments and
contribute the port upstream. Also, I have no idea if you would be
interested in running GCC on a Plan 9 fork and thus accept my
contribution.


Yet, after a careful read of this thread I realized that I might
be considered the kind of "new talent" Nathan is talking about.

So here is my perspective on this topic, "in the hope it helps but
without any warranty". :-D


I do not share many of Stallman's opinions (we are VERY different), but
when I write free software and contribute to a free software community,
what I want is long term assurances about one and only one topic: that
the software will stay free as in freedom, as a common good for the
whole humanity.

As of today, GPLv3 is the legal tool that best suit this goal.
I don't think it's perfect in this regards, but that's another story.


As an Italian I'm having a hard time trying to follow your reasoning
about Stallman being a problem to attract new talents.

I could understand such statement if he had committed actual crimes,
was legally persecuted, processed and condemned like Reiser.

But while I try, I cannot really understand why you think that his name
in the Steering Committee would drive away people from contributing GCC 


I ported GCC to Plan 9 because I want a free compiler suite for my OS.

Porting CLANG would have been easier (to some extent) BUT my choice was
political and Stallman in the Steering Committee is a long term
warranty that GCC development will not steer away from the Free
Software conception that I know, betraying my trust.


My impression is that you are, in absolute good faith, projecting your
own culture (quite US-centric, as far as I can deduce by this thread)
to the whole world.


I do not really know if the removing Stallman from the Steering
Committee would attract more US people in GCC development. Or if it
would attract more US people that now prefer to work in LLVM only
because of they feel somehow bad working with Stallman in the SC.


But I can assure you that, as Pankaj Jangid said before me, many many
people are attracted to GCC, as users and developers, BECAUSE of
Stallman presence, because they know that something like this
https://medium.com/@giacomo_59737/what-i-wish-i-knew-before-contributing-to-open-source-dd63acd20696
will not happen to them.


World wide, people do not LIKE Stallman, but we TRUST him on this.
Just like the GPLv3, RMS is not perfect, but it does ONE THING well.


So, since you care about demographics, please consider that.

Removing RMS you might attract more of certain US demographics,
but you will certainly alienate a lot of people world wide that
do not align your political values (despite respecting them a lot!)
and do not think that a compiler suite can fix US systemic issues
anyway.


As for me, I would NOT trust GCC (or FSF) in the long term, had
you to distance Stallman, because I've already seen with my eyes 
what happen when people do not have anything to loose to betray your
trust, and Stallman has all to lose by betraying Free Software. 


Maybe I'm not the "new talent" you are looking for.

But please, do not turn GCC into a US-centric project.



Giacomo

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Richard Kenner]

> I respect that you want stay out of the discussion, but I think that to
> present this as some larger societal issue which is somewhat academic
> is wrong. 

Sorry, I didn't mean to say or imply that.  What I meant to say is
that the very specific discussion we're having in this forum *mirrors*
the similar discussion that society is having in that the same issues
that are being discussed here are also being discussed there.

> And I hate to point to others, because I know these people, who
> worked closely with RMS, will get harassed to "proof" their
> allegations or will be told that since they were not physically
> attacked it doesn't count as harassment.

This is exactly what I mean by the need to draw a line.  At what point
does somebody's behavior rise to the level where it's necessary to
take action?  In other words, I think the question is less in understanding
what RMS's behavior has been (I suspect most people would agree on that),
but what the appropriate consequences of that behavior should be.

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Christopher Dimech]

> Sent: Tuesday, March 30, 2021 at 11:55 PM
> From: "Richard Kenner" <kenner@vlsi1.ultra.nyu.edu>
> To: dimech@gmx.com
> Cc: gcc@gcc.gnu.org, mark@klomp.org, matt@soulstudios.co.nz, nathan@acm.org
> Subject: Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee
>
> > Here is something close to the fundamental issue: Believing in
> > private life, that people are entitled to their own associations and
> > opinions (even bad ones!), and entitled to make their own mistakes,
> > too and that, barring some direct connection to work life or
> > extraordinary circumstance, that none of this is the concern of the
> > little platoons of finks lurking in the community,
>
> But I think that's exactly the question: when does something have a "direct
> connection to work life"?  Remember back in 2007 when US airlines were asking
> their pilots not to wear their uniforms to Unemployment offices because
> they were concerned about negative effect on their companies?

It is somewhat more complicated because his position con be recognised by
various people living in various countries, and thus does not fall into
one jurisdiction.  It seems to me that the situation is quite similar
to international law, where treaties requires all ratifying countries.
This can be extremely difficult.  Because Stallman is the founder, it
is in his prerogative to claim authority over the project.  I have been
a proponent over a transition and discussed this with him.  There could
have been possibilities for this to happen.  But in the climate that has
been created, he won't find the right conditions for a transition to occur.

Many had the chance to work with him but screwed it up.  People got to
understand this.

Christopher

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Richard Kenner]

> For a leadership position, which serves as an example for
> the community and to some extent demonstrates the values shared by the
> community, I think it is reasonable that there is a decreased
> expectation of privacy.

.. and libel and defamation laws in the US reflect that, for example.

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Jonathan Wakely]

On Tue, 30 Mar 2021 at 12:13, Andrew Haley wrote:
>
> On 3/30/21 11:34 AM, Jonathan Wakely wrote:
> > On Tue, 30 Mar 2021 at 11:14, Andrew Haley wrote:
>
> >> We could just rename it to "GCC", in much the same way that Acorn Risc
> >> Machine became Advanced Risc Machines, then just "Arm". But I'd much
> >> prefer that the FSF got its house in order.
> >
> > whynotboth.jpg
>
> I dunno, I don't want to see the FSF become the Parler of free software
> foundations.

I don't think GCC's continued involvement in the GNU Project will stop
that from happening.

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Andrew Haley]

On 3/30/21 11:34 AM, Jonathan Wakely wrote:
> On Tue, 30 Mar 2021 at 11:14, Andrew Haley wrote:

>> We could just rename it to "GCC", in much the same way that Acorn Risc
>> Machine became Advanced Risc Machines, then just "Arm". But I'd much
>> prefer that the FSF got its house in order.
> 
> whynotboth.jpg

I dunno, I don't want to see the FSF become the Parler of free software
foundations.

-- 
Andrew Haley  (he/him)
Java Platform Lead Engineer
Red Hat UK Ltd. <https://www.redhat.com>
https://keybase.io/andrewhaley
EAC8 43EB D3EF DB98 CC77 2FAD A5CD 6035 332F A671

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Pankaj Jangid]

Not quoting anyone here. As a long time user of GCC, I am just worried
about the project. Hence my few comments and reasons for being part of
this movement called free-software.

RMS paid a visit to our premise in year 2000 or may be 2001. The
institute where I started working as a Visiting Software Engineer in the
year 2000. After a few years he came to IIT Bombay. I travelled a long
distance just to listen him again. I knew. The speech would be same, the
cause would be same but still I went.

[I am not sure if I am allowed to write here or not. Though I have
contributed to Emacs, but I have never contributed source code to
GCC. And some people have repeatedly made me feel that this long thread
is exclusively for those who have committed source code lines in GCC.]

I don’t even know what is the qualification of the existing Steering
Committee (SC). I use GCC, because there is a cause associated with
it. Since, last five years I have been reading articles about
superiority of a competing compiler technology - LLVM. But the original
concerns of RMS are clearly visible. Apple keeps the important
optimizations to itself. And many other software giants are also doing
it. Fair enough. They stick to their ideology. They release the code
only when it is longer a threat to their competitive advantage.

I have seriously started looking into Rust when I read about resumption
of work on ‘gccrs’. Such is the effect of this movement on me.

Coming to diversity. I have never seen people travelling 12000 miles to
convince people to join a cause. I am not talking about the
sponsored/luxurious conferences. I am talking about sleeping in a
sleeping-bag for weeks and sharing home-cooked meals with fellow
free-software activists in the remotest part of the world. Don’t get me
wrong. I would certainly like someone who has done more than this for
diversity. I am speaking this from experience. And I don’t have the said
privileges.

My only request to the remaining members of the SC is that - do take a
wise decision. And there is no need to overwhelmed
yourself. Organization, cause, and here the project, is bigger than the
people. People may come and go, people may saying anything. The project
should continue to be lazer focused, and serve the society.

-- 
Regards,
Pankaj Jangid

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Jonathan Wakely]

On Tue, 30 Mar 2021 at 11:14, Andrew Haley wrote:
>
> On 3/30/21 10:47 AM, Didier Kryn wrote:
> > Le 30/03/2021 à 10:25, Jonathan Wakely via Gcc a écrit :
> >> I've been asking myself what benefit GCC gets from being linked to GNU and
> >> all I can think of is the DNS records for gcc.gnu.org.
> >
> >     Can you remind the meaning of GCC. Isn't it "*GNU* Compiler
> > Collection" ?
>
> It's been renamed at least once already, from "GNU C Compiler."
>
> >     If this is still true, it doesn't seem appropriate to "break the
> > communication channel" as you said in a previous mail. Or maybe you
> > might suggest a new name for the project (~:
>
> We could just rename it to "GCC", in much the same way that Acorn Risc
> Machine became Advanced Risc Machines, then just "Arm". But I'd much
> prefer that the FSF got its house in order.

whynotboth.jpg

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Andrew Haley]

On 3/30/21 10:47 AM, Didier Kryn wrote:
> Le 30/03/2021 à 10:25, Jonathan Wakely via Gcc a écrit :
>> I've been asking myself what benefit GCC gets from being linked to GNU and
>> all I can think of is the DNS records for gcc.gnu.org.
> 
>     Can you remind the meaning of GCC. Isn't it "*GNU* Compiler
> Collection" ?

It's been renamed at least once already, from "GNU C Compiler."

>     If this is still true, it doesn't seem appropriate to "break the
> communication channel" as you said in a previous mail. Or maybe you
> might suggest a new name for the project (~:

We could just rename it to "GCC", in much the same way that Acorn Risc
Machine became Advanced Risc Machines, then just "Arm". But I'd much
prefer that the FSF got its house in order.

-- 
Andrew Haley  (he/him)
Java Platform Lead Engineer
Red Hat UK Ltd. <https://www.redhat.com>
https://keybase.io/andrewhaley
EAC8 43EB D3EF DB98 CC77 2FAD A5CD 6035 332F A671

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Mark Wielaard]

Hi Alexandre,

On Mon, 2021-03-29 at 23:08 -0300, Alexandre Oliva via Gcc wrote:
> I request that, if you found anything that holds up to your high
> standards of evidence-checking, you submit it to the voting members
> of the FSF, so that we can look into it and take appropriate action.

If you are still a (voting) board member of the FSF I request that you
and the rest of the remaining old (voting) board members resign. It is
not that you are a bad person. But it is time for a fresh start of the
FSF. The current board has ignored these issues for too long. And I
know you count RMS as your friend. That makes it naturally hard for you
to see the evidence presented unbiased. And that is not a character
flaw. We all want to stick with our friends, that is only natural. But
it might also mean that we just don't want to see, or explain away, bad
things people tell us what our friends do. In which case it is better
to simply step aside.

Various FSF board members already left, or promised to leave, to make
way for a new generation of leaders, please take inspiration from them,
they are also fiercely dedicated to Free Software and believe it is
time for a fresh start.

Thanks,

Mark

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Didier Kryn]

Le 30/03/2021 à 11:47, Didier Kryn a écrit :

Sorry it wasn't Jonathan Wakely but Richard Biener

> Le 30/03/2021 à 10:25, Jonathan Wakely via Gcc a écrit :
>> I've been asking myself what benefit GCC gets from being linked to GNU and
>> all I can think of is the DNS records for gcc.gnu.org.
>     Can you remind the meaning of GCC. Isn't it "*GNU* Compiler
> Collection" ?
>
>     If this is still true, it doesn't seem appropriate to "break the
> communication channel" as you said in a previous mail. Or maybe you
> might suggest a new name for the project (~:
>
> --     Didier
>
>

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Jonathan Wakely]

On Tue, 30 Mar 2021 at 10:48, Didier Kryn wrote:
>
> Le 30/03/2021 à 10:25, Jonathan Wakely via Gcc a écrit :
> > I've been asking myself what benefit GCC gets from being linked to GNU and
> > all I can think of is the DNS records for gcc.gnu.org.
>
>     Can you remind the meaning of GCC. Isn't it "*GNU* Compiler
> Collection" ?
>
>     If this is still true, it doesn't seem appropriate to "break the
> communication channel" as you said in a previous mail. Or maybe you
> might suggest a new name for the project (~:

Sure, I have a few in mind.

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Didier Kryn]

Le 30/03/2021 à 10:25, Jonathan Wakely via Gcc a écrit :
> I've been asking myself what benefit GCC gets from being linked to GNU and
> all I can think of is the DNS records for gcc.gnu.org.

    Can you remind the meaning of GCC. Isn't it "*GNU* Compiler
Collection" ?

    If this is still true, it doesn't seem appropriate to "break the
communication channel" as you said in a previous mail. Or maybe you
might suggest a new name for the project (~:

--     Didier

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Mark Wielaard]

Hi Richard,

On Mon, 2021-03-29 at 08:18 -0400, Richard Kenner via Gcc wrote:
> I mostly want to stay out of this and will leave much of this discussion to
> others (though I have met RMS personally on a number of occaisions), but I
> want to mostly say that I agree with Jeff that it's important that this
> discussion stay civil.
> 
> I believe that to a large extent, the discussion here is reflective of a
> much larger discussion in society of to what extent, if at all, an entity
> associated with an person must or should take action based on things that
> that person does while not associated with that entity.

I respect that you want stay out of the discussion, but I think that to
present this as some larger societal issue which is somewhat academic
is wrong. People are talking about behavior that affects our
community. 

Even if it is "just" in some other community or speech addressed to
others it sents a message to those others to avoid the Free Software
community, GNU and GCC because it tolerates unkind behavior and
harassment.

And it does happen in our own community. There have been various
examples given in this thread alone. And I hate to point to others,
because I know these people, who worked closely with RMS, will get
harassed to "proof" their allegations or will be told that since they
were not physically attacked it doesn't count as harassment.

It is also at Free Software conferences (organized by the FSF):

https://wwahammy.com/on-safety-at-libreplanet/

   We write to you as former speakers and keynoters at LibrePlanet. We
   are concerned that the Code of Conduct for the event is not applied
   evenly, and in particular that Officers and Board Members seem to be
   exempt. This creates an intimidating and hostile environment for
   attendees, speakers and potential future participants who hear that
   unchecked harassment is allowed at the event.

It is also in the GNU project and at the FSF:

https://nitter.cc/paulnivin/status/1374499598853545986

   I worked at the FSF for 3 years and volunteered for over 6 years -
   that ended in 2004. I witnessed misogyny, sexual objectification,
   and abuse  carried out by RMS. I banded together with my coworkers,
   formed a union, negotiated a contract, and was elected shop steward.

https://nitter.cc/georgialyle/status/1374504389155508232

   I worked at the FSF from 2015-2018 & was shop steward for a while. I
   recall having a months (MONTHS) long conversation with ED John
   Sullivan about why racist & sexist 'hacker humor' from the 90s
   needed to be  removed from gnu.org. rms didn't get why it was
   harmful.

https://nitter.cc/baconandcoconut/status/1374803434344488967

   Checking in as another former staff person (2006 - 2010) who started
   the Women in Free Software Caucus and maintained a GNU project for
   over a decade. I tried "calling in" or educating for years, but the
   community RMS inspires is sexist, completely toxic and impervious to
   change.

This is not just incidents, it is a pattern where RMS is not facing any
consequences because he feels our common rules of decency and
respecting each other don't apply to him.

What is even worse is that when people try to discuss such issues he
encourages his cult of personality to attack those who try to tell
their stories (as we are already seeing on this list by comments from
people not even associated with GNU or GCC). I earlier talked about
when we had an open discussion about GNU governance issues and a female
GCC hacker spoke up. Once he had arranged "new moderators" for the
mailing-list his exact words were:

   The new moderators have now allowed people to defend the GNU Project
   and to defend me personally.  If you would like to do these things,
   please do not hold back.

The resulting torrent of misogynistic and racist posts were truly
shocking. He turns a community into a toxic and hostile place when
people question his authority by implying such people must be the enemy
of Free Software or GNU and that they must be stopped.

Cheers,

Mark

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Alfred M. Szmidt]

A good reason why Richard should be on the SC is to that he does
demonstrates the values of the GNU project, that of the free software
movement and the FSF.  GCC is a important project, and having the head
of the GNU project involved -- even if mostly uninvolved in daily
topics, is a ultimately a good thing.

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Jonathan Wakely]

On Mon, 29 Mar 2021, 11:13 Richard Biener via Gcc, <gcc@gcc.gnu.org> wrote:

>
> I do think that the request at hand puts specific pressure on the SC
> members that
> is unwarranted - you ask for them to respond but they are likely powerless
> as to
> the actual request.


I don't think they are powerless, but it doesn't necessarily matter.


  In fact were I on the SC I would suggest to all
> of my fellow SC
> members to resign and re-organize how GCC wants to be represented.  That
> would
> effectively break the communication channel between GCC and the GNU
> Project [the FSF]
> but at this point it might be the important signal to send.
>


I've been asking myself what benefit GCC gets from being linked to GNU and
all I can think of is the DNS records for gcc.gnu.org.

The downside is the link is that a vocal minority in the GNU community make
it a toxic and hostile place. Anybody who criticises RMS or questions his
authority is treated as an enemy who must be stopped. Ironically, those
rabid supporters of the cult of GNU might be what destroys the FSF as a
meaningful force for good.

I no longer see value in assigning my copyright to the FSF.

>

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Jonathan Wakely]

On Tue, 30 Mar 2021, 02:34 Christopher Dimech via Gcc, <gcc@gcc.gnu.org>
wrote:

>
>
>
>
> Insofar as Stallman is the foundation of all authority, He exercises that
> foundation because He is the founder of His own work.  He is the foundation
> upon which all other authority stands or falls. We use the term foundation
> with respect to the imagery of a building - houses and commercial buildings
> are erected upon a foundation.
>


Read the Four Freedoms at gnu.org. Nothing in the definitions of free
software requires us to obey the founder. You are a cultist who understands
nothing about free software and contributes nothing to it either.

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Alexandre Oliva]

Joseph,

On Mar 29, 2021, Joseph Myers <joseph@codesourcery.com> wrote:

> This is based on the longstanding, 
> well-documented patterns of how he has misbehaved towards women,

I have a great deal of respect for your attention to detail.

I can hardly believe you would make such a claim without having actually
looked into available evidence and cross-checked it.

Yet your claim is either (a) misleading or (b) conflicting with findings
by others who did so.

(a) is a distinct possibility, since many people may legitimately claim
RMS has been rude or harsh towards themselves, regardless of gender, and
that can be exaggerated into misbehavior, and made misleading by
phrasing it as if it was directed to any specific demographics.

(b) would surprise me, given how extensively evidence has been looked
into by myself and others.  I request that, if you found anything that
holds up to your high standards of evidence-checking, you submit it to
the voting members of the FSF, so that we can look into it and take
appropriate action.

Thanks in advance,

-- 
Alexandre Oliva, happy hacker  https://FSFLA.org/blogs/lxo/
   Free Software Activist         GNU Toolchain Engineer
        Vim, Vi, Voltei pro Emacs -- GNUlius Caesar

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Christopher Dimech]

> Sent: Tuesday, March 30, 2021 at 1:30 PM
> From: "Thomas Rodgers" <rodgert@appliantology.com>
> To: "Ian Lance Taylor" <iant@google.com>, "GCC Development" <gcc@gcc.gnu.org>, "Mark Wielaard" <mark@klomp.org>, "Nathan Sidwell" <nathan@acm.org>
> Subject: Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee
>
> On 2021-03-29 17:39, Christopher Dimech via Gcc wrote:
>
>
> > You might say that the fullness of Thomas Jefferson's legacy should be
> > acknowledged, but he did a bit more with his life than own slaves, just
> > as the Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. did more with his time on earth
> > than cheat on his wife and Mohandas Gandhi did more than write racist
> > tracts about black Africans.  We remember those men, and celebrate
> > them,
> > for other things.
>
> This is irrelevant to the discussion as to whether RMS should be member
> of GCC SC and whether or not the SC should make a public statement
> regarding the matter, one way or the other. The individuals you cite are
> all long dead, their entire history and legacy can be and is evaluated
> as much in the context of the time in which they lived as it is in the
> time in which we live now, with all the changes in social norms and
> standards that that entails. Stallman will no doubt be judged in a
> similar manner by history; founding the Free Software movement - good,
> the impact of his abusive and misogynistic behavior which (at best)
> belongs to another time - probably not so good.

I followed an interview he had with Dr. Diane Hamilton, and one cannot say
he was prejudiced against her.  I have had my own problems with women in
higher up positions that expect they can act to any level of irresponsibility
as some men have done.  I thus consider women simply as people.

> The question is, in this time, right now, is that specific last bit
> there. Is that the legacy that the GCC project and it's community of
> contributors (and by contributors, I mean those that actively currently
> do so) by continued association, wants for itself?
>
> I fully support the idea that the Steering Committee ought to make a
> definitive statement in that regard, one way or the other. Active
> contributors can then make whatever decisions they deem necessary based
> on that information.
>

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Christopher Dimech]

> Sent: Tuesday, March 30, 2021 at 12:20 PM
> From: "Joseph Myers" <joseph@codesourcery.com>
> To: "Mark Wielaard" <mark@klomp.org>
> Cc: "GCC Development" <gcc@gcc.gnu.org>, "Nathan Sidwell" <nathan@acm.org>
> Subject: Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee
>
> On Sun, 28 Mar 2021, Mark Wielaard wrote:
>
> > He does indeed show up randomly claiming authority even if the GNU
> > community has told him no. And it is important to say upfront he has
> > no authority and that his attempts to cancel the work of hardworking
> > GNU contributors is unwelcome. IMHO for the GCC community this means
> > to be explicit he doesn't have any authority and he shouldn't be on
> > the GCC steering committee.
>
> For example, consider the October 2019 discussion on libc-alpha of
> removing the abort "joke" from the glibc manual.  We rejected RMS's claims
> of authority to say that the joke should be kept, or kept indefinitely
> until various general points could be decided, and removed it from the
> manual anyway without waiting for conclusions on all those general points.
>
> RMS only has authority over decisions taken about individual GNU packages
> where the people developing those packages let him have that authority and
> make or refrain from making changes based on what he says.  We should not
> give him such authority by treating his views as having some significance
> not given to such views expressed by other people; changes he suggests can
> be considered, and accepted or rejected, on their merits.  And the abort
> joke case illustrates that in fact he is not given such authority, when
> package developers are confident to stand up to claims he makes of
> authority, and provides an example that can speed up the rejection of any
> such assertion of authority to micromanage things that might be made in
> future.
>
> I agree with the conclusion of Nathan's original message, that RMS behaves
> in a toxic way, it is harmful to have him listed as being in a leadership
> role that might suggest what he does is acceptable within the project, and
> he should not be on the SC.

Insofar as Stallman is the foundation of all authority, He exercises that foundation because He is the founder of His own work.  He is the foundation upon which all other authority stands or falls. We use the term foundation with respect to the imagery of a building - houses and commercial buildings are erected upon a foundation.

To say that Stallman defended Epstein for comments he made about his former
teacher are from an oceanic distance.  The person who really had ties with
Epstein was Bill Gates, who, instructed Bill Gates to donate $2 million to
MIT.

Stallman simply did not take into account the era of diminishing freedom
(not only in the digital world). Nowadays, with the left (communist) thought
police, who are always on the lookout for any subject to fire their cannons
on, free speech could be gone. If an opinion expressed goes against the prevailing inquisition of the time, the subject and the person is in hot waters.

Well, screw the inquisition.   Seems like World War I has just begun and martial
law has been declared, and this is reason enough, it seems, to expel the firebrand
without much ado, so he can eventually end up in concentration camps in Egypt.

> This is based on the longstanding,
> well-documented patterns of how he has misbehaved towards women, *not* on
> the opinions he has expressed on other subjects, *not* on his choices
> regarding the use of language, *not* on his attempts to insist on language
> being used in particular ways, and *not* on where or when he has chosen to
> express such views.
>
> For the same reasons, I think it is harmful for him to be Chief GNUisance
> (but as above, I think GNU packages should not give a Chief GNUisance
> authority to micromanage decisions, beyond ensuring GNU packages follow
> basic GNU free software principles and cooperate with each other and with
> their development communities), harmful for him to be on the FSF board,
> and harmful for him to be seen as leader of the free software movement.
> (For the last point, I don't think the free software movement needs a
> single leader; it needs many people advocating free software, and
> discussing issues related to free software, from diverse perspectives.
> RMS's ideas that form the foundation of the free software movement are
> still of fundamental importance today.  But other people can now build
> better on those ideas in today's context.)
>
> RMS does not, in fact, contribute usefully to the SC.  Any time he
> suggests some feature for GCC, whether a good or a bad idea, that could be
> done just as well on the public mailing list (which would be a better
> place to find someone possibly interested in implementing a feature, and
> to discuss a feature's merits, in any case) without being an SC member.
> He's sufficiently far removed from toolchain development that he's not
> good at making reasonable suggestions for toolchain changes in any case.
>
> We can consider individual proposals or patches from anyone on their
> merits.  We can have leaders who are accepted as leaders because
> contributors can see their relevant expertise that gives them legitimacy
> as leaders, and can see a good basis for decisions they make as leaders.
> But longstanding patterns of bad conduct by a leader, even when formally
> unrelated to the project, can reach the point where considering that
> person a leader is harmful to the project.  I think the ways RMS has
> behaved have long since reached the point where it is harmful for him to
> be considered a leader for GCC or GNU, and that's sufficient to stop
> considering him a leader (even if he were sufficiently involved to be able
> to contribute much more usefully on a technical level).
>
> --
> Joseph S. Myers
> joseph@codesourcery.com
>

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Thomas Rodgers]

On 2021-03-29 17:39, Christopher Dimech via Gcc wrote:


> You might say that the fullness of Thomas Jefferson's legacy should be
> acknowledged, but he did a bit more with his life than own slaves, just
> as the Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. did more with his time on earth
> than cheat on his wife and Mohandas Gandhi did more than write racist
> tracts about black Africans.  We remember those men, and celebrate 
> them,
> for other things.

This is irrelevant to the discussion as to whether RMS should be member 
of GCC SC and whether or not the SC should make a public statement 
regarding the matter, one way or the other. The individuals you cite are 
all long dead, their entire history and legacy can be and is evaluated 
as much in the context of the time in which they lived as it is in the 
time in which we live now, with all the changes in social norms and 
standards that that entails. Stallman will no doubt be judged in a 
similar manner by history; founding the Free Software movement - good, 
the impact of his abusive and misogynistic behavior which (at best) 
belongs to another time - probably not so good.

The question is, in this time, right now, is that specific last bit 
there. Is that the legacy that the GCC project and it's community of 
contributors (and by contributors, I mean those that actively currently 
do so) by continued association, wants for itself?

I fully support the idea that the Steering Committee ought to make a 
definitive statement in that regard, one way or the other. Active 
contributors can then make whatever decisions they deem necessary based 
on that information.

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Christopher Dimech]

> Sent: Tuesday, March 30, 2021 at 12:09 PM
> From: "Ian Lance Taylor" <iant@google.com>
> To: "Christopher Dimech" <dimech@gmx.com>
> Cc: "Soul Studios" <matt@soulstudios.co.nz>, "GCC Development" <gcc@gcc.gnu.org>, "Mark Wielaard" <mark@klomp.org>, "Nathan Sidwell" <nathan@acm.org>
> Subject: Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee
>
> On Mon, Mar 29, 2021 at 4:33 PM Christopher Dimech via Gcc
> <gcc@gcc.gnu.org> wrote:
> >
> > Here is something close to the fundamental issue: Believing in private life,
> > that people are entitled to their own associations and opinions (even bad ones!),
> > and entitled to make their own mistakes, too — and that, barring some direct
> > connection to work life or extraordinary circumstance, that none of this is
> > the concern of the little platoons of finks lurking in the community,
> > particularly when driven by facebook lackeys muzzling everyday journalists
> > who go against the grain.  We see this not only here but also to medical
> > information dealing with coronavirus and vaccines.
> 
> Please work to avoid using terms like "finks" or "lackeys" when
> describing members of the GCC community.  Please be respectful of
> other people's opinions.  Thanks.
> 
> The question here is not whether RMS is permitted to contribute to
> GCC.  I have not seen anybody arguing against that.  The question is
> whether the GCC community should put him in a declared leadership
> position.  For a leadership position, which serves as an example for
> the community and to some extent demonstrates the values shared by the
> community, I think it is reasonable that there is a decreased
> expectation of privacy.

It is an unrealistic expectation.  I could understand such attitudes towards 
Harvey Weinstein and the like.  But now the scalp-hunting has started to target
ordinary and often obscure people, and the offenses in question have nothing
to do with bigotry — it is simply having the unfashionable view of a public
controversy, or being somehow associated, however lightly with that controversy.

You might say that the fullness of Thomas Jefferson’s legacy should be
acknowledged, but he did a bit more with his life than own slaves, just
as the Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. did more with his time on earth
than cheat on his wife and Mohandas Gandhi did more than write racist
tracts about black Africans.  We remember those men, and celebrate them,
for other things.
 
> Ian
>

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Joseph Myers]

On Sun, 28 Mar 2021, Mark Wielaard wrote:

> He does indeed show up randomly claiming authority even if the GNU
> community has told him no. And it is important to say upfront he has
> no authority and that his attempts to cancel the work of hardworking
> GNU contributors is unwelcome. IMHO for the GCC community this means
> to be explicit he doesn't have any authority and he shouldn't be on
> the GCC steering committee.

For example, consider the October 2019 discussion on libc-alpha of 
removing the abort "joke" from the glibc manual.  We rejected RMS's claims 
of authority to say that the joke should be kept, or kept indefinitely 
until various general points could be decided, and removed it from the 
manual anyway without waiting for conclusions on all those general points.

RMS only has authority over decisions taken about individual GNU packages 
where the people developing those packages let him have that authority and 
make or refrain from making changes based on what he says.  We should not 
give him such authority by treating his views as having some significance 
not given to such views expressed by other people; changes he suggests can 
be considered, and accepted or rejected, on their merits.  And the abort 
joke case illustrates that in fact he is not given such authority, when 
package developers are confident to stand up to claims he makes of 
authority, and provides an example that can speed up the rejection of any 
such assertion of authority to micromanage things that might be made in 
future.

I agree with the conclusion of Nathan's original message, that RMS behaves 
in a toxic way, it is harmful to have him listed as being in a leadership 
role that might suggest what he does is acceptable within the project, and 
he should not be on the SC.  This is based on the longstanding, 
well-documented patterns of how he has misbehaved towards women, *not* on 
the opinions he has expressed on other subjects, *not* on his choices 
regarding the use of language, *not* on his attempts to insist on language 
being used in particular ways, and *not* on where or when he has chosen to 
express such views.

For the same reasons, I think it is harmful for him to be Chief GNUisance 
(but as above, I think GNU packages should not give a Chief GNUisance 
authority to micromanage decisions, beyond ensuring GNU packages follow 
basic GNU free software principles and cooperate with each other and with 
their development communities), harmful for him to be on the FSF board, 
and harmful for him to be seen as leader of the free software movement.  
(For the last point, I don't think the free software movement needs a 
single leader; it needs many people advocating free software, and 
discussing issues related to free software, from diverse perspectives.  
RMS's ideas that form the foundation of the free software movement are 
still of fundamental importance today.  But other people can now build 
better on those ideas in today's context.)

RMS does not, in fact, contribute usefully to the SC.  Any time he 
suggests some feature for GCC, whether a good or a bad idea, that could be 
done just as well on the public mailing list (which would be a better 
place to find someone possibly interested in implementing a feature, and 
to discuss a feature's merits, in any case) without being an SC member.  
He's sufficiently far removed from toolchain development that he's not 
good at making reasonable suggestions for toolchain changes in any case.

We can consider individual proposals or patches from anyone on their 
merits.  We can have leaders who are accepted as leaders because 
contributors can see their relevant expertise that gives them legitimacy 
as leaders, and can see a good basis for decisions they make as leaders.  
But longstanding patterns of bad conduct by a leader, even when formally 
unrelated to the project, can reach the point where considering that 
person a leader is harmful to the project.  I think the ways RMS has 
behaved have long since reached the point where it is harmful for him to 
be considered a leader for GCC or GNU, and that's sufficient to stop 
considering him a leader (even if he were sufficiently involved to be able 
to contribute much more usefully on a technical level).

-- 
Joseph S. Myers
joseph@codesourcery.com

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Ian Lance Taylor]

On Mon, Mar 29, 2021 at 4:33 PM Christopher Dimech via Gcc
<gcc@gcc.gnu.org> wrote:
>
> Here is something close to the fundamental issue: Believing in private life,
> that people are entitled to their own associations and opinions (even bad ones!),
> and entitled to make their own mistakes, too — and that, barring some direct
> connection to work life or extraordinary circumstance, that none of this is
> the concern of the little platoons of finks lurking in the community,
> particularly when driven by facebook lackeys muzzling everyday journalists
> who go against the grain.  We see this not only here but also to medical
> information dealing with coronavirus and vaccines.

Please work to avoid using terms like "finks" or "lackeys" when
describing members of the GCC community.  Please be respectful of
other people's opinions.  Thanks.

The question here is not whether RMS is permitted to contribute to
GCC.  I have not seen anybody arguing against that.  The question is
whether the GCC community should put him in a declared leadership
position.  For a leadership position, which serves as an example for
the community and to some extent demonstrates the values shared by the
community, I think it is reasonable that there is a decreased
expectation of privacy.

Ian

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Christopher Dimech]

Here is something close to the fundamental issue: Believing in private life,
that people are entitled to their own associations and opinions (even bad ones!),
and entitled to make their own mistakes, too — and that, barring some direct
connection to work life or extraordinary circumstance, that none of this is
the concern of the little platoons of finks lurking in the community, 
particularly when driven by facebook lackeys muzzling everyday journalists
who go against the grain.  We see this not only here but also to medical
information dealing with coronavirus and vaccines.

---------------------
Christopher Dimech
General Administrator - Naiad Informatics - GNU Project (Geocomputation)
- Geophysical Simulation
- Geological Subsurface Mapping
- Disaster Preparedness and Mitigation
- Natural Resource Exploration and Production
- Free Software Advocacy


> Sent: Tuesday, March 30, 2021 at 9:41 AM
> From: "Soul Studios" <matt@soulstudios.co.nz>
> To: "Richard Kenner" <kenner@vlsi1.ultra.nyu.edu>
> Cc: gcc@gcc.gnu.org, mark@klomp.org, nathan@acm.org
> Subject: Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee
>
> 
> On 30/03/2021 1:18 am, Richard Kenner wrote:
> >> I think I will leave this discussion up to those who have more
> >> familiarity with the guy than I do. There's no doubt that some of the
> >> stuff Stallman has written creeps me the hell out, and I think it was
> >> more the tone of the OP I objected to.
> > 
> > I mostly want to stay out of this and will leave much of this discussion to
> > others (though I have met RMS personally on a number of occaisions), but I
> > want to mostly say that I agree with Jeff that it's important that this
> > discussion stay civil.
> > 
> > I believe that to a large extent, the discussion here is reflective of a
> > much larger discussion in society of to what extent, if at all, an entity
> > associated with an person must or should take action based on things that
> > that person does while not associated with that entity.
> 
> It's worth noting that when RMS was kicked from FSF, there was a 
> 2k-strong petition in favour, and a 3.5k-strong petition against. So 
> clearly there is a discussion to be had, but as long as the left-wing 
> (through self-rightiousness and threats of exclusion/withdrawal) and the 
> right-wing (through belligerance and abuse/hostility) are trying 
> actively to shut down discussion, that will not take place.
>

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Soul Studios]

On 30/03/2021 1:18 am, Richard Kenner wrote:
>> I think I will leave this discussion up to those who have more
>> familiarity with the guy than I do. There's no doubt that some of the
>> stuff Stallman has written creeps me the hell out, and I think it was
>> more the tone of the OP I objected to.
> 
> I mostly want to stay out of this and will leave much of this discussion to
> others (though I have met RMS personally on a number of occaisions), but I
> want to mostly say that I agree with Jeff that it's important that this
> discussion stay civil.
> 
> I believe that to a large extent, the discussion here is reflective of a
> much larger discussion in society of to what extent, if at all, an entity
> associated with an person must or should take action based on things that
> that person does while not associated with that entity.

It's worth noting that when RMS was kicked from FSF, there was a 
2k-strong petition in favour, and a 3.5k-strong petition against. So 
clearly there is a discussion to be had, but as long as the left-wing 
(through self-rightiousness and threats of exclusion/withdrawal) and the 
right-wing (through belligerance and abuse/hostility) are trying 
actively to shut down discussion, that will not take place.

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Christophe de Dinechin]

> On 27 Mar 2021, at 08:08, Didier Kryn <kryn@in2p3.fr> wrote:
> 
>     I've been lurking on this list for a while but never contributed in
> any way to the project. Therefore I understand my voice has little weight.
> 
>     I'm terrified by this campaign of harassment against the person who
> has given the biggest contribution to free software.

+1

> This confirms to my
> eyes that the People *is not* the defensor of Liberty and only the law
> can defend it. The success of this campaign will prove that even the
> liberty to express personnal opinions seems excessive to the People.
> This is how terror begins.
> 
> --     Didier
> 
> 

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Richard Kenner]

> I think I will leave this discussion up to those who have more 
> familiarity with the guy than I do. There's no doubt that some of the 
> stuff Stallman has written creeps me the hell out, and I think it was 
> more the tone of the OP I objected to.

I mostly want to stay out of this and will leave much of this discussion to
others (though I have met RMS personally on a number of occaisions), but I
want to mostly say that I agree with Jeff that it's important that this
discussion stay civil.

I believe that to a large extent, the discussion here is reflective of a
much larger discussion in society of to what extent, if at all, an entity
associated with an person must or should take action based on things that
that person does while not associated with that entity.

I think all of us understand that, on the one extreme, there are some
things so eggregious that entities must take action and on the other, we
don't want companies taking actions against employees that express
unpopular political positions or are members of marginalized minorities.
There's the famous Supreme Court Justice who said "I can't define
pornography, but I know it when I see it", but I think it's worse here: I
suspect that many more of us would agree on whether a particular piece of
media is pornography or not than would agree on whether a particular
behavior does or doesn't cross the line in terms of the obligations of an
entity associated with that person.

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Richard Biener]

On Fri, Mar 26, 2021 at 9:03 PM Nathan Sidwell <nathan@acm.org> wrote:
>
> [double sigh, attaching a pdf causes it to be blocked, and I guess the number of
> URLs is also triggering a spam trap for the follow up.  I have removed many of
> the URLS from this, you'll have to use your google-fu for sources.  I emailed
> several members of the SC, and don't want to bomb them with yet a third copy. ]
>
> Dear members of the GCC Steering Committee (SC),  I ask you to remove Richard
> Stallman (RMS) from the SC, or, should you chose not to do so, make a clear
> statement as to why he remains.

As far as I know the GCC Steering Committee (SC) acts as the "GNU maintainer" of
GCC with respect to how the GNU project is set up.  That likely makes it a
representative of the "GCC project" even though the SC rarely presents itself as
such.

I've never been asked to endorse or vote members of the SC, instead it seems to
have "self-appointed" itself in the beginning and when moving back under the
GNU umbrella likely the FSF "appointed" the original set of members as the GNU
maintainer.  I know some members voluntarily leaved but I have no idea about the
process of new members entering the SC - apart from suggesting the SC is
self-appointed (but GNU processes likely require the GNU project
leaders consent).

So this whole story points at a dysfunctional set up of the
representation of the GCC
project.  I suppose GNU (sub-)projects are not supposed to represent themselves.

I would not consider voting RMS onto the SC at this point, in fact I'd
not re-elect him.
I would even ask him to resign from this position.

But being inclusive also means being inclusive to people with
different opinions,
so I welcome technical contribution to GCC by RMS.  If RMS acts contrary to
(unwritten) code of conducts inside the GCC community then appropriate sanctions
should apply.

I do think that the request at hand puts specific pressure on the SC
members that
is unwarranted - you ask for them to respond but they are likely powerless as to
the actual request.  In fact were I on the SC I would suggest to all
of my fellow SC
members to resign and re-organize how GCC wants to be represented.  That would
effectively break the communication channel between GCC and the GNU
Project [the FSF]
but at this point it might be the important signal to send.

Richard.

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Christopher Dimech]

This is quite similar to James Madison and John Jay, two of the founding
father of the United States Bill of Rights, which enshrined guarantees of
personal freedoms and rights within the American Constitution.

Many companies rely on their founder to be the chief salesperson.  This is
difficult as the company grows, but the founder is uniquely suited to convince
others about free software in this case.

Certainly not Nathan Sidwell, Deb Nicholson, or Neil McGovern.  Or the others.
If people think that the Jeffrey Epstein problems are going to be resolved by
going after Stallman, they are highly misguided.  Money and power often buy what
they shouldn't.

> Sent: Monday, March 29, 2021 at 11:21 AM
> From: "Soul Studios" <matt@soulstudios.co.nz>
> To: "Mark Wielaard" <mark@klomp.org>, "GCC Development" <gcc@gcc.gnu.org>
> Cc: "Nathan Sidwell" <nathan@acm.org>
> Subject: Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee
>
> > We are not talking about some single recent incident, but about
> > decades of problematic behavior. At the last face-to-face GNU Tools
> > Cauldron, everybody I talked to about it had some story about being
> > harassed by RMS, had witnessed such harassment or heard from or knew
> > someone who had been.
>
> I think I will leave this discussion up to those who have more
> familiarity with the guy than I do.

Have worked with Stallman and never experienced any stories that
are being perpetuated in discussions.

> There's no doubt that some of the
> stuff Stallman has written creeps me the hell out, and I think it was
> more the tone of the OP I objected to.

Yes, there are things that people can disagree with him about personal views.
Which crimes has he committed exactly?  And under which jurisdiction?  I have
to work with a lot of people that I could not particularly like on a personal
level.  I cannot see how people expect that others stay out of politics because
they have some acrimony against them!

> Giving twitter as reference points doesn't really help matters, but it
> appears as though the problems are more offline than on.
>

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Soul Studios]

> We are not talking about some single recent incident, but about
> decades of problematic behavior. At the last face-to-face GNU Tools
> Cauldron, everybody I talked to about it had some story about being
> harassed by RMS, had witnessed such harassment or heard from or knew
> someone who had been.

I think I will leave this discussion up to those who have more 
familiarity with the guy than I do. There's no doubt that some of the 
stuff Stallman has written creeps me the hell out, and I think it was 
more the tone of the OP I objected to.
Giving twitter as reference points doesn't really help matters, but it 
appears as though the problems are more offline than on.

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Jonathan Wakely]

You showed your colours with your first few posts, don't try to pretend you
are anything but a zealot and a nasty troll.

Come back when you've contributed more to the GNU project than attacking
those you see as its enemies. The people you are attacking have done more
for Free Software than you ever will.



On Sun, 28 Mar 2021, 19:43 Christopher Dimech via Gcc, <gcc@gcc.gnu.org>
wrote:

>
>
> ---------------------
> Christopher Dimech
> General Administrator - Naiad Informatics - GNU Project (Geocomputation)
> - Geophysical Simulation
> - Geological Subsurface Mapping
> - Disaster Preparedness and Mitigation
> - Natural Resource Exploration and Production
> - Free Software Advocacy
>
>
> > Sent: Monday, March 29, 2021 at 6:13 AM
> > From: "Mark Wielaard" <mark@klomp.org>
> > To: "JeanHeyd Meneide" <phdofthehouse@gmail.com>
> > Cc: "GCC Development" <gcc@gcc.gnu.org>, "Nathan Sidwell" <
> nathan@acm.org>
> > Subject: Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee
> >
> > Hi,
> >
> > On Sun, Mar 28, 2021 at 10:33:15AM -0400, JeanHeyd Meneide wrote:
> > >      This is unacceptable. The only reason I was told - as early as
> > > yesterday, by Free Software advocates, to my socially distanced face -
> > > that Stallman was still here is because he was powerless and had no
> > > effect on the project. That it was run by the caring,
> > > community-oriented stewardship of the "real volunteers" doing the
> > > "actual work".
> >
> > I do not think those people were lying or trying to deceive you. This
> > is what we hope the actual situation is. But...
> >
> > >      Further digging into Stallman's own words and behavior also
> > > reveals that he continues to flex this influence throughout the
> > > project (and in other places), showing up (generally unsolicited) into
> > > places to do this kind of gross and extreme harassment and engaging in
> > > canceling our own hardworking contributors that actually write code
> > > and do work. This is not a person who is just here for "historical
> > > reasons" and who has "no power"; this is an active, perpetual threat
> > > to hardworking and contributing members of the Free Software movement.
> >
> > He does indeed show up randomly claiming authority even if the GNU
> > community has told him no. And it is important to say upfront he has
> > no authority and that his attempts to cancel the work of hardworking
> > GNU contributors is unwelcome. IMHO for the GCC community this means
> > to be explicit he doesn't have any authority and he shouldn't be on
> > the GCC steering committee.
> >
> > >       I will never, ever contribute another line of code, another
> > > proposal implementation[6], another optimization, or another
> > > new/better library implementation to GCC and all of its affiliated
> > > projects, including the compilers, glibc, libstdc++, the potential
> > > upcoming Rust implementation, and more until this problem is not
> > > "address", but *fixed*. If you never fix it, I will never return.
> > >
> > > Wish you and your community all the best in sorting this out,
> >
> > Thanks. I do hope we can finally fix this and welcome you back.
>
> The attacks against Richard Stallman do not stem from any of his actual
> statements. Instead, his statements have been given a subversive context
> that fits into your narrative that wishes to smear him, followed a demand
> that your interpretation of his words be considered canon — even though
> evidence to the contrary  summarily disproves your position.
>
> Stallman’s work and advocacy speaks for itself; and this holds true for
> anyone
> in the field of technology, where a person’s work is judged by a system of
> meritocracy.
>
> Linus Torvalds was also famously criticized by those who took offense to
> his
> no-nonsense attitude and firm speech. Did the quality of the Linux kernel
> suffer? Was being unoffensive a requirement as maintainer? The answer is
> NO.
>
> Stallman has never been accused of doing physical harm to anyone, and
> therefore
> any assumptions about the harmful nature or context of his words should
> not be
> conflated with his professional capacity to hold a leadership role within
> the FSF,
> the very organization that he founded.
>
>
>
> > Cheers,
> >
> > Mark
> >
>

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Siddhesh Poyarekar]

On 3/28/21 8:20 PM, Alexandre Oliva wrote:
> Thanks for clarifying your understanding of Nathan's goal.
> 
> I may indeed have misread and mistaken Nathan's goal and means.
> 
> I thought the goal was to improve the GCC community by addressing the
> gender imbalance, and that the means (misguided, IMHO) was to distance
> ourselves from RMS.

There's only one point of departure; you chose to interpret RMS' removal 
from the steering committee to be the solution while I (and others) have 
pointed out that it is a notable step in that direction.

> Your assertiveness came across to me as a correction of my mistake, but
> I didn't see any reason to prefer your understanding over mine, until
> Nathan posted today's followup.

My reading of every gcc contributor that has participated in this 
discussion seems to reinforce my understanding over yours.  Not one of 
them has conveyed IMO that RMS' removal from the board will magically 
solve gender or diversity issues with the community.

> Now it looks like you were right, but I still find that a little hard to
> believe.  Are you really sure about your understanding?
> 
> Do you know for a fact that Nathan agrees with your understanding?
> 
> Do you know with certainty of anyone else who shares that understanding
> with you and him?

In my opinion there is nothing to indicate from any of the contributors' 
statements that they see RMS' removal from the steering committee as a 
final solution to D&I issues in the GNU community.  I'm happy to be 
corrected by others if they think I've misinterpreted their comments and 
if they indeed think that RMS' removal from the steering committee will 
solve all diversity issues.

Siddhesh

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Christopher Dimech]

---------------------
Christopher Dimech
General Administrator - Naiad Informatics - GNU Project (Geocomputation)
- Geophysical Simulation
- Geological Subsurface Mapping
- Disaster Preparedness and Mitigation
- Natural Resource Exploration and Production
- Free Software Advocacy


> Sent: Monday, March 29, 2021 at 6:13 AM
> From: "Mark Wielaard" <mark@klomp.org>
> To: "JeanHeyd Meneide" <phdofthehouse@gmail.com>
> Cc: "GCC Development" <gcc@gcc.gnu.org>, "Nathan Sidwell" <nathan@acm.org>
> Subject: Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee
>
> Hi,
> 
> On Sun, Mar 28, 2021 at 10:33:15AM -0400, JeanHeyd Meneide wrote:
> >      This is unacceptable. The only reason I was told - as early as
> > yesterday, by Free Software advocates, to my socially distanced face -
> > that Stallman was still here is because he was powerless and had no
> > effect on the project. That it was run by the caring,
> > community-oriented stewardship of the "real volunteers" doing the
> > "actual work".
> 
> I do not think those people were lying or trying to deceive you. This
> is what we hope the actual situation is. But...
> 
> >      Further digging into Stallman's own words and behavior also
> > reveals that he continues to flex this influence throughout the
> > project (and in other places), showing up (generally unsolicited) into
> > places to do this kind of gross and extreme harassment and engaging in
> > canceling our own hardworking contributors that actually write code
> > and do work. This is not a person who is just here for "historical
> > reasons" and who has "no power"; this is an active, perpetual threat
> > to hardworking and contributing members of the Free Software movement.
> 
> He does indeed show up randomly claiming authority even if the GNU
> community has told him no. And it is important to say upfront he has
> no authority and that his attempts to cancel the work of hardworking
> GNU contributors is unwelcome. IMHO for the GCC community this means
> to be explicit he doesn't have any authority and he shouldn't be on
> the GCC steering committee.
> 
> >       I will never, ever contribute another line of code, another
> > proposal implementation[6], another optimization, or another
> > new/better library implementation to GCC and all of its affiliated
> > projects, including the compilers, glibc, libstdc++, the potential
> > upcoming Rust implementation, and more until this problem is not
> > "address", but *fixed*. If you never fix it, I will never return.
> > 
> > Wish you and your community all the best in sorting this out,
> 
> Thanks. I do hope we can finally fix this and welcome you back.

The attacks against Richard Stallman do not stem from any of his actual
statements. Instead, his statements have been given a subversive context
that fits into your narrative that wishes to smear him, followed a demand
that your interpretation of his words be considered canon — even though
evidence to the contrary  summarily disproves your position.

Stallman’s work and advocacy speaks for itself; and this holds true for anyone
in the field of technology, where a person’s work is judged by a system of 
meritocracy. 

Linus Torvalds was also famously criticized by those who took offense to his
no-nonsense attitude and firm speech. Did the quality of the Linux kernel 
suffer? Was being unoffensive a requirement as maintainer? The answer is
NO.

Stallman has never been accused of doing physical harm to anyone, and therefore
any assumptions about the harmful nature or context of his words should not be
conflated with his professional capacity to hold a leadership role within the FSF,
the very organization that he founded.



> Cheers,
> 
> Mark
>

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Alexandre Oliva]

On Mar 28, 2021, Mark Wielaard <mark@klomp.org> wrote:

> It shows we don't tolerate harassment in our project.

It shows we will favor and engage in harassment against a certain
demographic group, while pretending or believing it will somehow
make for a welcoming atmosphere.

> everybody I talked to about it had some story about being
> harassed by RMS, had witnessed such harassment or heard from or knew
> someone who had been.

... which, even if true, still requires quite a lot of twisting and
forcing and breaking to make it fit the sexism narrative presented as
the motivating factor.

And this is the problem with most of the witchhunting in place.  There
are plenty of allegations circulating all over the Internet, and most of
them fit either or both of two patterns: actual evidence twisted and
forced to fit a false narrative, or repeated hearsay, most likely
fabricated or exaggerated, without a traceable ultimate source.

Which is not to say that there aren't exceptions, the first-hand
narratives.  Those invariably fit in either of two patterns: they look
like smoking gun evidence of very wrongdoing, but they are disputed by
other who were just as much there and are just as trustworthy, or they
paint the known picture of person who has well-known flaws and is indeed
frequently difficult to deal with, but those facts don't help construct
the false boogeyman narrative.

Of course conclusions may be different once one starts picking evidence
that is favorable to make one's case, and disregarding that which
opposes evidence.  Most people would agree that this is not the way to
go to find truth, be it for science or for justice.

> he is against enforcing any anti-harassment policy some GNU
> mailinglist is currently being used to organize a doxing campaign

Doxing and harassment are not welcome, and that post has already been
solved, with his support and before you brought it up, FWIW.

Harassment has been tolerated before, which made this decision a little
more difficult, because the target of an earlier and ongoing harassment
campaign was someone in a position of power in the GNU project itself.
My understanding is that there was a decision to not silence that
discussion, although some moderators had engaged in suppression of
dissenting positions to the (still) ongoing harassment.  As anyone who
studied history can predict, authoritarian positions tend to suppress or
attempt to suppress dissent, while freedom-respecting ones endure it.

If that was a trial run of the sort of leadership that was trying to
replace Richard's, I'd much rather keep the devil we know.  That alleged
witch may have some warts indeed, but they're not quite as ugly as the
prosecutors/judges/executioners's.


> You link to a parody of a request of tens of Free Software foundation
> projects and thousands of Free Software hackers

If truth finding were a matter of headcount, we might still be forced to
believe we're on a flat planet orbited by a star.  But if we're to use
that measuring stick, petitions calling for the FSF to keep Richard at
the FSF board have been signed by more people, translated to more
languages, despite there being more of them, and hosted on platforms
that are less hostile to software freedom, and not being signed multiple
times by the same few people on behalf of multiple organizations.


> Sometimes satire is a way to deal with difficult problems, but I don't
> think that is appropriate here

How about this one instead?
https://avilarenata.medium.com/stallman-d824724b0083

  RMS’ principled stances cause an uncomfortable cognitive dissonance
  for them. They would rather kill a sacrificial Gnu than admit their
  own shortcomings. It is significant that the letter demanding his
  resignation must be signed using Microsoft’s Github platform, and that
  many organizations taking position are openly accepting money from
  Google and other predatory companies.


Or this one?
https://www.wetheweb.org/post/cancel-we-the-web

  The paradox of Stallman is that while his pointedness and stubbornness
  leads many to dismiss him as a jerk, his stubbornness and
  confrontations are actually rooted in his life-long obsession with
  morality. Though you may disagree, there is ample reason to believe he
  has come to hold his views from a concerted, rigorous, good-faith
  effort to be a voice for good in the world.

  “Stallman… is a hard man to like. He is driven, often impatient. His
  anger can flare at friend as easily as foe. He is uncompromising and
  persistent; patient in both.”
    Lawrence Lessig, Harvard Law Professor, democracy activist

  “Even if I strongly disagree with a position or an idea, an expression
  of an idea, advocacy of an idea, and even if the vast majority of the
  public disagrees with the idea and finds it offensive, that is not a
  justification for suppressing the idea. And it’s not a justification
  for taking away the equal rights of the person who espouses that idea
  including the right to continue holding a tenured position or other
  prominent position for which that person is qualified.”
    Nadine Strossen, Civil Rights Activist, first female President of the ACLU


Maybe this one?
https://medium.com/@whoisylvia/richard-stallman-has-been-vilified-by-those-who-dont-know-him-a3907b25b4c7

  As an active feminist and one who has witnessed much bad behavior
  among tech CEOs over the past 30 years, I think that accusing Richard
  Stallman of not supporting women, gays, or any other minority group is
  false

-- 
Alexandre Oliva, happy hacker  https://FSFLA.org/blogs/lxo/
   Free Software Activist         GNU Toolchain Engineer
        Vim, Vi, Voltei pro Emacs -- GNUlius Caesar

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Mark Wielaard]

Hi,

On Sun, Mar 28, 2021 at 10:33:15AM -0400, JeanHeyd Meneide wrote:
>      This is unacceptable. The only reason I was told - as early as
> yesterday, by Free Software advocates, to my socially distanced face -
> that Stallman was still here is because he was powerless and had no
> effect on the project. That it was run by the caring,
> community-oriented stewardship of the "real volunteers" doing the
> "actual work".

I do not think those people were lying or trying to deceive you. This
is what we hope the actual situation is. But...

>      Further digging into Stallman's own words and behavior also
> reveals that he continues to flex this influence throughout the
> project (and in other places), showing up (generally unsolicited) into
> places to do this kind of gross and extreme harassment and engaging in
> canceling our own hardworking contributors that actually write code
> and do work. This is not a person who is just here for "historical
> reasons" and who has "no power"; this is an active, perpetual threat
> to hardworking and contributing members of the Free Software movement.

He does indeed show up randomly claiming authority even if the GNU
community has told him no. And it is important to say upfront he has
no authority and that his attempts to cancel the work of hardworking
GNU contributors is unwelcome. IMHO for the GCC community this means
to be explicit he doesn't have any authority and he shouldn't be on
the GCC steering committee.

>       I will never, ever contribute another line of code, another
> proposal implementation[6], another optimization, or another
> new/better library implementation to GCC and all of its affiliated
> projects, including the compilers, glibc, libstdc++, the potential
> upcoming Rust implementation, and more until this problem is not
> "address", but *fixed*. If you never fix it, I will never return.
> 
> Wish you and your community all the best in sorting this out,

Thanks. I do hope we can finally fix this and welcome you back.

Cheers,

Mark

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Christopher Dimech]

The methods used to put a leash on Torvalds and Assange and the methods used
to put one on Stallman are too similar to ignore.

It hasn’t stopped there either, it is now being wielded as a way to yoke all
developers of mainstream software (whether mainstream and non-free, or mainstream
and under a free license) into indentured servants of projects that have been
taken over by corporate donors who then force even original authors to do things
the way the monopoly wanted, or get out.


---------------------
Christopher Dimech
General Administrator - Naiad Informatics - GNU Project (Geocomputation)
- Geophysical Simulation
- Geological Subsurface Mapping
- Disaster Preparedness and Mitigation
- Natural Resource Exploration and Production
- Free Software Advocacy


> Sent: Monday, March 29, 2021 at 12:47 AM
> From: "Mark Wielaard" <mark@klomp.org>
> To: "GCC Development" <gcc@gcc.gnu.org>
> Cc: "Nathan Sidwell" <nathan@acm.org>
> Subject: Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee
>
> Alexandre,
> 
> Making our community more welcoming is indeed a process. And some
> steps will just be symbolic. But I don't believe removing RMS from
> (perceived) leadership positions in the GNU project and from the FSF
> is just symbolic. And even for a symbolic step it is a powerful
> one. It shows we don't tolerate harassment in our project. And I do
> hope it doesn't end with that step. We also have to decide whether we
> still want to be associated with the FSF. Hopefully the FSF takes
> their responsibility and replaces the whole board to show we can start
> with a clean slate.
> 
> One issue is that as long as GCC is associated with RMS and the FSF
> others who could help us won't because the FSF is that toxic now:
> https://www.outreachy.org/blog/2021-03-23/fsf-participation-barred/
> And they are far from the only Free Software project who has said
> something similar.
> 
> We are not talking about some single recent incident, but about
> decades of problematic behavior. At the last face-to-face GNU Tools
> Cauldron, everybody I talked to about it had some story about being
> harassed by RMS, had witnessed such harassment or heard from or knew
> someone who had been.
> 
> For years people have tried to help him see how his actions and words
> might hurt others, even if they are completely logically correct to
> himself. And obviously that is sometimes hard, nobody is perfect, but
> hopefully we get a little better every time. But this never happened.
> And it really needs to stop.
> 
> RMS actively undermines those who try to make our community a little
> bit more welcoming. Violating anti-harassment policies of
> conferences. Even those from the FSF by claiming to be above those
> policies because of his leadership position or using his position to
> tell staff they cannot enforce such policies against others. Because
> he is against enforcing any anti-harassment policy some GNU
> mailinglist is currently being used to organize a doxing campaign
> (publishing photos, address and calls to report to the local police
> station to get her house raided and arrested) for simply saying the
> same things we are discussing here now.
> 
> I witnessed something similar recently when we had setup the
> mailinglist to discuss improving governance of the GNU project. When a
> female GNU (GCC) volunteer spoke up she got attacked and harassed. We
> told the harassers that was totally unacceptable and blocked them from
> sending more emails to the list. RMS arranged for those people to get
> unblocked to continue their hate campaign on the public GNU list so
> they could "defend him and the GNU project". That was followed by a
> torrent of hate to the list making any discussion impossible and
> making women feel like they were specifically targeted. He still
> hasn't learned that his words and actions are dog whistles for
> misogynists, transphobics and racists. This really has to stop.
> 
> You link to a parody of a request of tens of Free Software foundation
> projects and thousands of Free Software hackers who are calling for
> the removal of the entire Board of the Free Software Foundation and
> for Richard M. Stallman to be removed from all leadership positions,
> including the GNU Project. For similar reasons that people here are
> now calling for RMS to be removed from the GCC steering committee.
> 
> The real letter is here: https://rms-open-letter.github.io/
> 
> Sometimes satire is a way to deal with difficult problems, but I don't
> think that is appropriate here and I hope people take these issues
> seriously, because I think they are.
> 
> Mark
>

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Jeff Law]

On 3/27/2021 2:49 PM, Martin Liška wrote:
> On 3/26/21 9:02 PM, Nathan Sidwell wrote:
>> Dear members of the GCC Steering Committee (SC),  I ask you to remove 
>> Richard Stallman (RMS)
>
> I do fully support Nathan's request.

Speaking strictly for myself, not as a representative of the steering 
committee or Tachyum, I also fully support Nathan's request.


jeff

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Alexandre Oliva]

On Mar 28, 2021, Alexandre Oliva <oliva@gnu.org> wrote:

> Nathan posted today's followup.

Erhm...  Nathan, please accept my apologies.

I misread someone else's message under the false impression
it had come from you.

-- 
Alexandre Oliva, happy hacker  https://FSFLA.org/blogs/lxo/
   Free Software Activist         GNU Toolchain Engineer
        Vim, Vi, Voltei pro Emacs -- GNUlius Caesar

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Jeff Law]

Setting aside whether or not RMS should be associated with the GCC 
project for a bit, I'm particularly concerned about the tone of some of 
the messages on this thread.  People can and will have differences, and 
that is fine.  But the discussion needs to stay civil.

To those who have crossed the line (no, I'm not going to call them out 
by name) -- please tone things done.  We have a long history here of not 
banning individuals from posting and I don't want to see this discussion 
escalate to the point where we're forced to take what I would consider 
drastic measures.

To those on the receiving end, I'm terribly sorry that some people can't 
disagree in a civil manner and I hope their behavior does not discourage 
you from continuing to contribute to GCC.

Jeff

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Alexandre Oliva]

Hello, Siddhesh,

Thanks for clarifying your understanding of Nathan's goal.

I may indeed have misread and mistaken Nathan's goal and means.

I thought the goal was to improve the GCC community by addressing the
gender imbalance, and that the means (misguided, IMHO) was to distance
ourselves from RMS.

Your assertiveness came across to me as a correction of my mistake, but
I didn't see any reason to prefer your understanding over mine, until
Nathan posted today's followup.

Now it looks like you were right, but I still find that a little hard to
believe.  Are you really sure about your understanding?

Do you know for a fact that Nathan agrees with your understanding?

Do you know with certainty of anyone else who shares that understanding
with you and him?

-- 
Alexandre Oliva, happy hacker  https://FSFLA.org/blogs/lxo/
   Free Software Activist         GNU Toolchain Engineer
        Vim, Vi, Voltei pro Emacs -- GNUlius Caesar

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[JeanHeyd Meneide]

Dear GCC Community,

    Hi. My name is JeanHeyd Meneide, my online moniker is "ThePhD"
(not an actual Doctor. Yet!). I spend a lot of my time hacking on C
and C++. Some of the things I've done include:

- Contributing (mostly) a <span> Implementation [1]
- Doing a GSoC for GCC and writing up about fixes for vector<bool> and
other data structures that can be helpful [2] (a lot of these
optimizations were rolled into libstdc++'s normal vector<bool> by
François Dumont, thank you!!)
- Implementing part of my own proposal's [[nodiscard("should have a
reason")]] [3]
- Macros for identifying literal and wide literal encoding, to aid in
code portability and pre-emptively solving a user concern while
preparing for a new C++ proposal that allows identifying the execution
and wide execution character sets deployed by the compiler [4]

     I'm also helping to solve the intmax_t problems in C and C++ so
we can have wider integer types beyond "long long" blessed by
numeric_limits.[5]

     I am also, recently, the ISO/IEC JTC1 SC22 WG14 - Programming
Languages, C: Project Editor. I do not speak for ISO/IEC, the C
Committee, or my National Body here; this e-mail is sent in a person
capacity, but my affiliations should be known (not that they are
hidden with a cursory search, either).

    Asides from many other things, last and most importantly I am a
GCC advocate, a libstdc++ contributor, and an individual who spent an
exorbitant and extraordinary amount of my free time contributing to
these projects and the wider ecosystems in the hope that C, C++, Rust,
and related Systems Programming languages would continue to flourish
under the leadership done by the people here. By the time I was going
to finish my education, the goal was to ramp up these contributions
10-fold. There is much room for improvements in fundamental C and C++
architecture and library, leading me on a long, long journey, to where
I am today.

     I am exactly one of the "future contributors" referenced in the
e-mails by Wakely, Rodgers, Wielaard, Poyarekar, and others here, even
if they were not explicitly thinking of me. Or, I would be:

On Sun, Mar 28, 2021 Mark Wielaard <mark@klomp.org> wrote:
>
> ...
>
> I witnessed something similar recently when we had setup the
> mailinglist to discuss improving governance of the GNU project. When a
> female GNU (GCC) volunteer spoke up she got attacked and harassed. We
> told the harassers that was totally unacceptable and blocked them from
> sending more emails to the list. RMS arranged for those people to get
> unblocked to continue their hate campaign on the public GNU list so
> they could "defend him and the GNU project". That was followed by a
> torrent of hate to the list making any discussion impossible and
> making women feel like they were specifically targeted. He still
> hasn't learned that his words and actions are dog whistles for
> misogynists, transphobics and racists. This really has to stop.
>
> ...

     This is unacceptable. The only reason I was told - as early as
yesterday, by Free Software advocates, to my socially distanced face -
that Stallman was still here is because he was powerless and had no
effect on the project. That it was run by the caring,
community-oriented stewardship of the "real volunteers" doing the
"actual work".

     That is not what this e-mail reveals.

     Further digging into Stallman's own words and behavior also
reveals that he continues to flex this influence throughout the
project (and in other places), showing up (generally unsolicited) into
places to do this kind of gross and extreme harassment and engaging in
canceling our own hardworking contributors that actually write code
and do work. This is not a person who is just here for "historical
reasons" and who has "no power"; this is an active, perpetual threat
to hardworking and contributing members of the Free Software movement.

     I refuse to spend my free time supporting a single bigot and an
entire globe's worth of toxic enthusiasts who actively support his
behavior while letting people like him create horrible ecosystems for
other developers. At the start of this conversation, I was much like
Nathan; I wanted an explanation. Having reviewed the facts of the
situation, I can now unequivocally say that an explanation is not even
close to enough.

      I will never, ever contribute another line of code, another
proposal implementation[6], another optimization, or another
new/better library implementation to GCC and all of its affiliated
projects, including the compilers, glibc, libstdc++, the potential
upcoming Rust implementation, and more until this problem is not
"address", but *fixed*. If you never fix it, I will never return.

Wish you and your community all the best in sorting this out,
JeanHeyd Meneide

[#]: References -
https://gist.github.com/ThePhD/bcfad83f01e6a641c3fda5cfc013a72d

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Jonathan Wakely]

On Sun, 28 Mar 2021, 13:50 Mark Wielaard, <mark@klomp.org> wrote:

> RMS actively undermines those who try to make our community a little
> bit more welcoming. Violating anti-harassment policies of
> conferences. Even those from the FSF by claiming to be above those
> policies because of his leadership position or using his position to
> tell staff they cannot enforce such policies against others. Because
> he is against enforcing any anti-harassment policy some GNU
> mailinglist is currently being used to organize a doxing campaign
> (publishing photos, address and calls to report to the local police
> station to get her house raided and arrested) for simply saying the
> same things we are discussing here now.
>
> I witnessed something similar recently when we had setup the
> mailinglist to discuss improving governance of the GNU project. When a
> female GNU (GCC) volunteer spoke up she got attacked and harassed. We
> told the harassers that was totally unacceptable and blocked them from
> sending more emails to the list. RMS arranged for those people to get
> unblocked to continue their hate campaign on the public GNU list so
> they could "defend him and the GNU project". That was followed by a
> torrent of hate to the list making any discussion impossible and
> making women feel like they were specifically targeted. He still
> hasn't learned that his words and actions are dog whistles for
> misogynists, transphobics and racists. This really has to stop.
>

We even have a GNU maintainer* with no link to GCC sending abusive emails
in this thread, because he feels such harassment is acceptable.

* He is listed as maintainer on gnu.org despite the project having no
public release and an empty repo. It looks like vapourware that only exists
in his head, but he's still a proud "GNU maintainer". If that's who GNU
welcomes, count me out.

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Mark Wielaard]

Alexandre,

Making our community more welcoming is indeed a process. And some
steps will just be symbolic. But I don't believe removing RMS from
(perceived) leadership positions in the GNU project and from the FSF
is just symbolic. And even for a symbolic step it is a powerful
one. It shows we don't tolerate harassment in our project. And I do
hope it doesn't end with that step. We also have to decide whether we
still want to be associated with the FSF. Hopefully the FSF takes
their responsibility and replaces the whole board to show we can start
with a clean slate.

One issue is that as long as GCC is associated with RMS and the FSF
others who could help us won't because the FSF is that toxic now:
https://www.outreachy.org/blog/2021-03-23/fsf-participation-barred/
And they are far from the only Free Software project who has said
something similar.

We are not talking about some single recent incident, but about
decades of problematic behavior. At the last face-to-face GNU Tools
Cauldron, everybody I talked to about it had some story about being
harassed by RMS, had witnessed such harassment or heard from or knew
someone who had been.

For years people have tried to help him see how his actions and words
might hurt others, even if they are completely logically correct to
himself. And obviously that is sometimes hard, nobody is perfect, but
hopefully we get a little better every time. But this never happened.
And it really needs to stop.

RMS actively undermines those who try to make our community a little
bit more welcoming. Violating anti-harassment policies of
conferences. Even those from the FSF by claiming to be above those
policies because of his leadership position or using his position to
tell staff they cannot enforce such policies against others. Because
he is against enforcing any anti-harassment policy some GNU
mailinglist is currently being used to organize a doxing campaign
(publishing photos, address and calls to report to the local police
station to get her house raided and arrested) for simply saying the
same things we are discussing here now.

I witnessed something similar recently when we had setup the
mailinglist to discuss improving governance of the GNU project. When a
female GNU (GCC) volunteer spoke up she got attacked and harassed. We
told the harassers that was totally unacceptable and blocked them from
sending more emails to the list. RMS arranged for those people to get
unblocked to continue their hate campaign on the public GNU list so
they could "defend him and the GNU project". That was followed by a
torrent of hate to the list making any discussion impossible and
making women feel like they were specifically targeted. He still
hasn't learned that his words and actions are dog whistles for
misogynists, transphobics and racists. This really has to stop.

You link to a parody of a request of tens of Free Software foundation
projects and thousands of Free Software hackers who are calling for
the removal of the entire Board of the Free Software Foundation and
for Richard M. Stallman to be removed from all leadership positions,
including the GNU Project. For similar reasons that people here are
now calling for RMS to be removed from the GCC steering committee.

The real letter is here: https://rms-open-letter.github.io/

Sometimes satire is a way to deal with difficult problems, but I don't
think that is appropriate here and I hope people take these issues
seriously, because I think they are.

Mark

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Christopher Dimech]

The socialist collective angry bullshit will go on rising from the dead.
Richard Stallman executed a truly extraordinary feat that has never been
accomplished by anyone before.

---------------------
Christopher Dimech
General Administrator - Naiad Informatics - GNU Project (Geocomputation)
- Geophysical Simulation
- Geological Subsurface Mapping
- Disaster Preparedness and Mitigation
- Natural Resource Exploration and Production
- Free Software Advocacy


> Sent: Sunday, March 28, 2021 at 2:27 PM
> From: "Óscar Fuentes" <ofv@wanadoo.es>
> To: gcc@gcc.gnu.org
> Subject: Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee
>
> This was meant to be sent by private e-mail. I'm sorry it was sent to
> the list by mistake, it was not my intention to stir this debate.
> 
> I invite everyone to keep discussing this topic in a cold-headed way.
> Specially, I'll like to see the base problem (lack of diversity)
> addresed, instead of its hypothetical cause (and even more hypothetical
> solution.) Let's see if, for once, instead of grand symbolic gestures
> that solve nothing the problem is attacked with effective and sustained
> measures.
> 
> Sorry again for my intrusion on the list.
> 
> Óscar Fuentes <ofv@wanadoo.es> writes:
> 
> > We on the West are on the brink of entering into a new cycle of social
> > madness, fueled by Postmodern nonsense.
> >
> > Thank you for being brave enough to confront the self-righteous mob, and
> > thank you for doing it with such equanimity and eloquence.
> >
> > Alexandre Oliva via Gcc <gcc@gcc.gnu.org> writes:
> >
> >> Nathan,
> >>
> >> I think you identify an important problem of gender imbalance in our
> >> community.  It is quite likely that finding ways to make our community
> >> more welcoming to demographic groups that are currently less present
> >> than in the distribution in the global population could reduce this
> >> imbalance.
> >>
> >> However, your diagnosis as to the supposed cause of the problem makes no
> >> sense to me.  You said yourself that Stallman has not participated in
> >> our community for decades.  Much as I know, his very hands-off influence
> >> in the SC has been mostly limited to licensing and strategic issues,
> >> e.g. the GPLv3 and Runtime Exception relicensing, to ensure copyleft
> >> defenses were in place to avoid abuse of such features as plugins.
> >>
> >>
> >> It may be very convenient to paint a boogey-man and expel it because
> >> that became fashionable.  But sacrificing a goat or a lamb does not
> >> expiate our own sins, and expelling someone who hasn't even been present
> >> in the community can't be expected to make any real difference to that
> >> matter; it would rather make us seem *less* welcoming and more
> >> intolerant, and suggest other motivations for the move.
> >>
> >>
> >> Let's be real and honest, when was the last time anyone in the GCC
> >> community was called out for sexist behavior?  When was there even
> >> conversation about it, and about how sexist behavior is not acceptable
> >> and not to be accepted among participants in the GCC community?  What
> >> was our latest collective action to promote e.g. gender equity within
> >> the community?
> >>
> >> If we were to shift our collective blame over this very real and
> >> undesirable problem to someone who has any direct authority over the
> >> project, why not suggesting expelling e.g. the entire Steering Committee
> >> for its evident failure to address the problem?  (I don't think it's a
> >> good idea, but that would be the first thing to try if we were to blame
> >> "management"/"leadership" rather than ourselves for it)
> >>
> >> What could support any rational belief that having RMS one extra level
> >> removed from our technical community would bring about anything
> >> resembling a solution to the very undesirable and unjust gender
> >> imbalance you've correctly identified?
> >>
> >>
> >> The action you propose, besides the absence of effect in making our
> >> community actually more welcoming, because he's already absent, would
> >> send the opposite of a welcoming signal to people with controversial or
> >> impopular opinions, to people at a certain spot in the neurodiversity
> >> spectrum, and to many others who oppose this sort of mob rule.
> >>
> >>
> >> How about we set out to take individual and collective actions that
> >> actually address the problem *in* our community?  We don't need anyone's
> >> approval to call out sexist acts, nor to invite and train people with an
> >> interest in compiler technology, nor to maintain a welcoming atmosphere.
> >>
> >> A regime of terror to maintain a false appearance of a welcoming
> >> atmosphere won't get us there.
> >>
> >> If we undertake such actions, individually or collecetively, you might
> >> be surprised (but I won't be) that he, even absent from the community,
> >> would support these actions, which is the very opposite of the picture
> >> you paint.
> >>
> >> Our taking effective action on our own would help show what the real
> >> issues and intents are, and it would tell apart those who are really
> >> interested in solving the gender imbalance and the social injustices
> >> causing it, like you and me, from those who are abusing that flag as a
> >> trojan horse to serve nefarious purposes, as suggested and illustrated
> >> in https://ultralux97.medium.com/stallman-must-be-removed-a3061b09fb22
> 
>

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Óscar Fuentes]

This was meant to be sent by private e-mail. I'm sorry it was sent to
the list by mistake, it was not my intention to stir this debate.

I invite everyone to keep discussing this topic in a cold-headed way.
Specially, I'll like to see the base problem (lack of diversity)
addresed, instead of its hypothetical cause (and even more hypothetical
solution.) Let's see if, for once, instead of grand symbolic gestures
that solve nothing the problem is attacked with effective and sustained
measures.

Sorry again for my intrusion on the list.

Óscar Fuentes <ofv@wanadoo.es> writes:

> We on the West are on the brink of entering into a new cycle of social
> madness, fueled by Postmodern nonsense.
>
> Thank you for being brave enough to confront the self-righteous mob, and
> thank you for doing it with such equanimity and eloquence.
>
> Alexandre Oliva via Gcc <gcc@gcc.gnu.org> writes:
>
>> Nathan,
>>
>> I think you identify an important problem of gender imbalance in our
>> community.  It is quite likely that finding ways to make our community
>> more welcoming to demographic groups that are currently less present
>> than in the distribution in the global population could reduce this
>> imbalance.
>>
>> However, your diagnosis as to the supposed cause of the problem makes no
>> sense to me.  You said yourself that Stallman has not participated in
>> our community for decades.  Much as I know, his very hands-off influence
>> in the SC has been mostly limited to licensing and strategic issues,
>> e.g. the GPLv3 and Runtime Exception relicensing, to ensure copyleft
>> defenses were in place to avoid abuse of such features as plugins.
>>
>>
>> It may be very convenient to paint a boogey-man and expel it because
>> that became fashionable.  But sacrificing a goat or a lamb does not
>> expiate our own sins, and expelling someone who hasn't even been present
>> in the community can't be expected to make any real difference to that
>> matter; it would rather make us seem *less* welcoming and more
>> intolerant, and suggest other motivations for the move.
>>
>>
>> Let's be real and honest, when was the last time anyone in the GCC
>> community was called out for sexist behavior?  When was there even
>> conversation about it, and about how sexist behavior is not acceptable
>> and not to be accepted among participants in the GCC community?  What
>> was our latest collective action to promote e.g. gender equity within
>> the community?
>>
>> If we were to shift our collective blame over this very real and
>> undesirable problem to someone who has any direct authority over the
>> project, why not suggesting expelling e.g. the entire Steering Committee
>> for its evident failure to address the problem?  (I don't think it's a
>> good idea, but that would be the first thing to try if we were to blame
>> "management"/"leadership" rather than ourselves for it)
>>
>> What could support any rational belief that having RMS one extra level
>> removed from our technical community would bring about anything
>> resembling a solution to the very undesirable and unjust gender
>> imbalance you've correctly identified?
>>
>>
>> The action you propose, besides the absence of effect in making our
>> community actually more welcoming, because he's already absent, would
>> send the opposite of a welcoming signal to people with controversial or
>> impopular opinions, to people at a certain spot in the neurodiversity
>> spectrum, and to many others who oppose this sort of mob rule.
>>
>>
>> How about we set out to take individual and collective actions that
>> actually address the problem *in* our community?  We don't need anyone's
>> approval to call out sexist acts, nor to invite and train people with an
>> interest in compiler technology, nor to maintain a welcoming atmosphere.
>>
>> A regime of terror to maintain a false appearance of a welcoming
>> atmosphere won't get us there.
>>
>> If we undertake such actions, individually or collecetively, you might
>> be surprised (but I won't be) that he, even absent from the community,
>> would support these actions, which is the very opposite of the picture
>> you paint.
>>
>> Our taking effective action on our own would help show what the real
>> issues and intents are, and it would tell apart those who are really
>> interested in solving the gender imbalance and the social injustices
>> causing it, like you and me, from those who are abusing that flag as a
>> trojan horse to serve nefarious purposes, as suggested and illustrated
>> in https://ultralux97.medium.com/stallman-must-be-removed-a3061b09fb22

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Óscar Fuentes]

We on the West are on the brink of entering into a new cycle of social
madness, fueled by Postmodern nonsense.

Thank you for being brave enough to confront the self-righteous mob, and
thank you for doing it with such equanimity and eloquence.

Alexandre Oliva via Gcc <gcc@gcc.gnu.org> writes:

> Nathan,
>
> I think you identify an important problem of gender imbalance in our
> community.  It is quite likely that finding ways to make our community
> more welcoming to demographic groups that are currently less present
> than in the distribution in the global population could reduce this
> imbalance.
>
> However, your diagnosis as to the supposed cause of the problem makes no
> sense to me.  You said yourself that Stallman has not participated in
> our community for decades.  Much as I know, his very hands-off influence
> in the SC has been mostly limited to licensing and strategic issues,
> e.g. the GPLv3 and Runtime Exception relicensing, to ensure copyleft
> defenses were in place to avoid abuse of such features as plugins.
>
>
> It may be very convenient to paint a boogey-man and expel it because
> that became fashionable.  But sacrificing a goat or a lamb does not
> expiate our own sins, and expelling someone who hasn't even been present
> in the community can't be expected to make any real difference to that
> matter; it would rather make us seem *less* welcoming and more
> intolerant, and suggest other motivations for the move.
>
>
> Let's be real and honest, when was the last time anyone in the GCC
> community was called out for sexist behavior?  When was there even
> conversation about it, and about how sexist behavior is not acceptable
> and not to be accepted among participants in the GCC community?  What
> was our latest collective action to promote e.g. gender equity within
> the community?
>
> If we were to shift our collective blame over this very real and
> undesirable problem to someone who has any direct authority over the
> project, why not suggesting expelling e.g. the entire Steering Committee
> for its evident failure to address the problem?  (I don't think it's a
> good idea, but that would be the first thing to try if we were to blame
> "management"/"leadership" rather than ourselves for it)
>
> What could support any rational belief that having RMS one extra level
> removed from our technical community would bring about anything
> resembling a solution to the very undesirable and unjust gender
> imbalance you've correctly identified?
>
>
> The action you propose, besides the absence of effect in making our
> community actually more welcoming, because he's already absent, would
> send the opposite of a welcoming signal to people with controversial or
> impopular opinions, to people at a certain spot in the neurodiversity
> spectrum, and to many others who oppose this sort of mob rule.
>
>
> How about we set out to take individual and collective actions that
> actually address the problem *in* our community?  We don't need anyone's
> approval to call out sexist acts, nor to invite and train people with an
> interest in compiler technology, nor to maintain a welcoming atmosphere.
>
> A regime of terror to maintain a false appearance of a welcoming
> atmosphere won't get us there.
>
> If we undertake such actions, individually or collecetively, you might
> be surprised (but I won't be) that he, even absent from the community,
> would support these actions, which is the very opposite of the picture
> you paint.
>
> Our taking effective action on our own would help show what the real
> issues and intents are, and it would tell apart those who are really
> interested in solving the gender imbalance and the social injustices
> causing it, like you and me, from those who are abusing that flag as a
> trojan horse to serve nefarious purposes, as suggested and illustrated
> in https://ultralux97.medium.com/stallman-must-be-removed-a3061b09fb22

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Christopher Dimech]

More rats for the wood pile. 

---------------------
Christopher Dimech
General Administrator - Naiad Informatics - GNU Project (Geocomputation)
- Geophysical Simulation
- Geological Subsurface Mapping
- Disaster Preparedness and Mitigation
- Natural Resource Exploration and Production
- Free Software Advocacy


> Sent: Sunday, March 28, 2021 at 8:49 AM
> From: "Martin Liška" <mliska@suse.cz>
> To: "Nathan Sidwell" <nathan@acm.org>, "GCC Development" <gcc@gcc.gnu.org>
> Subject: Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee
>
> On 3/26/21 9:02 PM, Nathan Sidwell wrote:
> > Dear members of the GCC Steering Committee (SC),  I ask you to remove Richard Stallman (RMS)
> 
> I do fully support Nathan's request.
> 
> Martin
>

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Martin Jambor]

Hi,

On Fri, Mar 26 2021, Nathan Sidwell wrote:
>
> Dear members of the GCC Steering Committee (SC),  I ask you to remove Richard 
> Stallman (RMS) from the SC, or, should you chose not to do so, make a clear 
> statement as to why he remains.
>

I wholeheartedly agree with Nathan.

In a few weeks I will have to ask selected GSoC students to sign away
their copyright to FSF and it will be very hard for me to make that
request - and doubly so if any of the students is female.  It is true
that RMS has not directly interacted with us for a long time and so
removing him from the committee may amount only to a gesture, but it
would be a powerful and very helpful gesture in this regard.  And IMHO
not just in this regard.

Thank you,

Martin

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Andrea Corallo]

Didier Kryn <kryn@in2p3.fr> writes:

>     I'm terrified by this campaign of harassment against the person who
> has given the biggest contribution to free software.

FWIW I find this terrifying too.  What scare me the most is that people
supporting RMS are indeed scared of coming out publicly by the
aggressiveness of the campaign itself.

Each one of us can be morally judged by others: how do we behave, what
we write, what's the company we work for...  I can myself be very
sensitive to some of these topics, but this is not what Free Software is
about.  Free Software is about Free Software and IMHO we should be here
just to progress on that.

Regards

  Andrea

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Martin Liška]

On 3/26/21 9:02 PM, Nathan Sidwell wrote:
> Dear members of the GCC Steering Committee (SC),  I ask you to remove Richard Stallman (RMS)

I do fully support Nathan's request.

Martin

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Christopher Dimech]

It's not a good idea to disrespect the Gnu Father.

---------------------
Christopher Dimech
General Administrator - Naiad Informatics - GNU Project (Geocomputation)
- Geophysical Simulation
- Geological Subsurface Mapping
- Disaster Preparedness and Mitigation
- Natural Resource Exploration and Production
- Free Software Advocacy


> Sent: Sunday, March 28, 2021 at 5:12 AM
> From: "Siddhesh Poyarekar" <siddhesh@gotplt.org>
> To: "Alexandre Oliva" <oliva@gnu.org>, "Nathan Sidwell" <nathan@acm.org>
> Cc: "GCC Development" <gcc@gcc.gnu.org>
> Subject: Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee
>
> On 3/27/21 7:08 PM, Alexandre Oliva via Gcc wrote:
> > It may be very convenient to paint a boogey-man and expel it because
> > that became fashionable.  But sacrificing a goat or a lamb does not
> > expiate our own sins, and expelling someone who hasn't even been present
> > in the community can't be expected to make any real difference to that
> > matter; it would rather make us seem *less* welcoming and more
> > intolerant, and suggest other motivations for the move.
>
> Except that it's not a boogeyman.  There is evidence for the documented
> instances of misconduct and have been corroborated by multiple people.
>
> > Let's be real and honest, when was the last time anyone in the GCC
> > community was called out for sexist behavior?  When was there even
> > conversation about it, and about how sexist behavior is not acceptable
> > and not to be accepted among participants in the GCC community?  What
> > was our latest collective action to promote e.g. gender equity within
> > the community?
>
> The discussion is about RMS' damaging conduct (especially with
> non-privileged groups) over the years and the steering committees stand
> on it, not about steps we take to make the community more welcoming to
> non-privileged groups.  The latter definitely needs a discussion, but as
> far as this thread is concerned, it is a digression.
>
> > If we were to shift our collective blame over this very real and
> > undesirable problem to someone who has any direct authority over the
> > project, why not suggesting expelling e.g. the entire Steering Committee
> > for its evident failure to address the problem?  (I don't think it's a
> > good idea, but that would be the first thing to try if we were to blame
> > "management"/"leadership" rather than ourselves for it)
>
> Nope, you're the one shifting blame for RMS' conduct on to the steering
> committee and the gcc community.
>
> > What could support any rational belief that having RMS one extra level
> > removed from our technical community would bring about anything
> > resembling a solution to the very undesirable and unjust gender
> > imbalance you've correctly identified?
>
> No but it will make it clear that toxic behaviour has no place in the
> gcc community.  That's step zero.  The FSF still hasn't got its act
> together in that regard unfortunately.
>
> > How about we set out to take individual and collective actions that
> > actually address the problem *in* our community?  We don't need anyone's
> > approval to call out sexist acts, nor to invite and train people with an
> > interest in compiler technology, nor to maintain a welcoming atmosphere.
>
> Sexist acts, discriminatory comments and inappropriate behaviour by RMS
> have been called out.  It is now the steering committee's responsibility
> to share their stand on it.
>
> On 3/27/21 9:15 PM, Alexandre Oliva via Gcc wrote:
>  > It looks like statements of any position whatsoever are invitations
>  > for pressure and trouble right now.
>
> On the flip side, not making a statement would be a statement in itself.
>   You know that though, which is why you advocate silence.
>
> Siddhesh
>

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Siddhesh Poyarekar]

On 3/27/21 7:08 PM, Alexandre Oliva via Gcc wrote:
> It may be very convenient to paint a boogey-man and expel it because
> that became fashionable.  But sacrificing a goat or a lamb does not
> expiate our own sins, and expelling someone who hasn't even been present
> in the community can't be expected to make any real difference to that
> matter; it would rather make us seem *less* welcoming and more
> intolerant, and suggest other motivations for the move.

Except that it's not a boogeyman.  There is evidence for the documented 
instances of misconduct and have been corroborated by multiple people.

> Let's be real and honest, when was the last time anyone in the GCC
> community was called out for sexist behavior?  When was there even
> conversation about it, and about how sexist behavior is not acceptable
> and not to be accepted among participants in the GCC community?  What
> was our latest collective action to promote e.g. gender equity within
> the community?

The discussion is about RMS' damaging conduct (especially with 
non-privileged groups) over the years and the steering committees stand 
on it, not about steps we take to make the community more welcoming to 
non-privileged groups.  The latter definitely needs a discussion, but as 
far as this thread is concerned, it is a digression.

> If we were to shift our collective blame over this very real and
> undesirable problem to someone who has any direct authority over the
> project, why not suggesting expelling e.g. the entire Steering Committee
> for its evident failure to address the problem?  (I don't think it's a
> good idea, but that would be the first thing to try if we were to blame
> "management"/"leadership" rather than ourselves for it)

Nope, you're the one shifting blame for RMS' conduct on to the steering 
committee and the gcc community.

> What could support any rational belief that having RMS one extra level
> removed from our technical community would bring about anything
> resembling a solution to the very undesirable and unjust gender
> imbalance you've correctly identified?

No but it will make it clear that toxic behaviour has no place in the 
gcc community.  That's step zero.  The FSF still hasn't got its act 
together in that regard unfortunately.

> How about we set out to take individual and collective actions that
> actually address the problem *in* our community?  We don't need anyone's
> approval to call out sexist acts, nor to invite and train people with an
> interest in compiler technology, nor to maintain a welcoming atmosphere.

Sexist acts, discriminatory comments and inappropriate behaviour by RMS 
have been called out.  It is now the steering committee's responsibility 
to share their stand on it.

On 3/27/21 9:15 PM, Alexandre Oliva via Gcc wrote:
 > It looks like statements of any position whatsoever are invitations
 > for pressure and trouble right now.

On the flip side, not making a statement would be a statement in itself. 
  You know that though, which is why you advocate silence.

Siddhesh

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Alexandre Oliva]

On Mar 27, 2021, Jonathan Wakely <jwakely.gcc@gmail.com> wrote:

> But listing his name on our web page as a leader of the project
> surely makes a difference to how the project is perceived.

You're probably right that it does, just maybe not quite in the way you
seem to perceive it.

The Free Software community is a lot more diverse in opinions than the
corporate-centered fossal scene where the present moral panic (no
offense intended with this term; I aim to *not* pass a judgment on its
legitimacy by using it) appears to be running strongest.

If FSF's experiences in 2019 are of any use, though the wave of
community pressure for Richard's removal or resignation hit hard, the
wave of complaints that he had resigned, shortly thereafter, was about
an order of magnitude stronger, according to my analysis of the data
that was made available to me.

Right now, published voices are quite divided, but there are also lots
of people being driven into silence by the aggressiveness of the
emotional peer pressure.  There are also reports of one-sided corporate
pressure.  Richard's support base is not quite as vocal, furious or
deep-pocketed, but it's far more numerous and more discrete.

All in all, it looks to me like, in the long term, a public stance in
alignment with present emotional demands is more likely to backfire, and
make the project seem less welcoming, than staying put.

> The active developers know he is not involved in any significant way, but
> you wouldn't know that from the web page.

You wouldn't know about allegations against him from the web page
either.  It's quite easy to find them in web searches, and they're also
consistent in disclaiming his direct participation in software
development projects, so it should be fine.

> Is it helpful to give that impression?

At least in my circles, his name signals strong commitment to respect
for the freedoms of software users, and that's the criterion that IMHO
should matter the most for GNU and all of its subprojects.

As for being inclusive and kind, these are also very important goals
that we should devote attention and effort to.  But despite numerous
claims, these are not points of dissent with him.  The fears spread by
this sort of campaign are far more effective at pushing contributors
away than the reality that they twist and exaggerate.


> If the SC decision is that it's fine, then making a statement to that
> effect seems necessary.

It looks like statements of any position whatsoever are invitations for
pressure and trouble right now.


Now, there's another thing I've learned during my tenure at the FSF:
pressure upon decision-making bodies is not conducive of or propitious
for long-term reasoning or rational, thought-through decisions.  It
takes time for difficult decisions to mature, even for an individual,
let alone for a group that may require multiple cycles of interaction
for convergence.

I've learned that this kind of pressure is undesirable, when I worked to
foment it and then was taught, even by the very person who was supported
by that pressure, that, rather than offer useful guidance, pressure
created difficulties for the collective decision-making body.


So, thanks for listening, and for keeping this conversation civil and
kind despite the very strong emotions that a lot of people are feeling
and expressing,

-- 
Alexandre Oliva, happy hacker  https://FSFLA.org/blogs/lxo/
   Free Software Activist         GNU Toolchain Engineer
        Vim, Vi, Voltei pro Emacs -- GNUlius Caesar

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Jonathan Wakely]

On Sat, 27 Mar 2021, 13:40 Alexandre Oliva via Gcc, <gcc@gcc.gnu.org> wrote:

>
> What could support any rational belief that having RMS one extra level
> removed from our technical community would bring about anything
> resembling a solution to the very undesirable and unjust gender
> imbalance you've correctly identified?
>

I completely agree that more work is needed to address the very real
imbalance. But listing his name on our web page as a leader of the project
surely makes a difference to how the project is perceived.

The active developers know he is not involved in any significant way, but
you wouldn't know that from the web page. The link to the SC is right at
the top of the gcc.gnu.org home page. Surely that gives a misleading
impression to potential new contributors, of all genders and backgrounds.
Is it helpful to give that impression?

If the SC decision is that it's fine, then making a statement to that
effect seems necessary. Which is the alternative Nathan asked for. Act or
explain, but don't stay silent. I think it's fair to ask for that.

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Alexandre Oliva]

Nathan,

I think you identify an important problem of gender imbalance in our
community.  It is quite likely that finding ways to make our community
more welcoming to demographic groups that are currently less present
than in the distribution in the global population could reduce this
imbalance.

However, your diagnosis as to the supposed cause of the problem makes no
sense to me.  You said yourself that Stallman has not participated in
our community for decades.  Much as I know, his very hands-off influence
in the SC has been mostly limited to licensing and strategic issues,
e.g. the GPLv3 and Runtime Exception relicensing, to ensure copyleft
defenses were in place to avoid abuse of such features as plugins.


It may be very convenient to paint a boogey-man and expel it because
that became fashionable.  But sacrificing a goat or a lamb does not
expiate our own sins, and expelling someone who hasn't even been present
in the community can't be expected to make any real difference to that
matter; it would rather make us seem *less* welcoming and more
intolerant, and suggest other motivations for the move.


Let's be real and honest, when was the last time anyone in the GCC
community was called out for sexist behavior?  When was there even
conversation about it, and about how sexist behavior is not acceptable
and not to be accepted among participants in the GCC community?  What
was our latest collective action to promote e.g. gender equity within
the community?

If we were to shift our collective blame over this very real and
undesirable problem to someone who has any direct authority over the
project, why not suggesting expelling e.g. the entire Steering Committee
for its evident failure to address the problem?  (I don't think it's a
good idea, but that would be the first thing to try if we were to blame
"management"/"leadership" rather than ourselves for it)

What could support any rational belief that having RMS one extra level
removed from our technical community would bring about anything
resembling a solution to the very undesirable and unjust gender
imbalance you've correctly identified?


The action you propose, besides the absence of effect in making our
community actually more welcoming, because he's already absent, would
send the opposite of a welcoming signal to people with controversial or
impopular opinions, to people at a certain spot in the neurodiversity
spectrum, and to many others who oppose this sort of mob rule.


How about we set out to take individual and collective actions that
actually address the problem *in* our community?  We don't need anyone's
approval to call out sexist acts, nor to invite and train people with an
interest in compiler technology, nor to maintain a welcoming atmosphere.

A regime of terror to maintain a false appearance of a welcoming
atmosphere won't get us there.

If we undertake such actions, individually or collecetively, you might
be surprised (but I won't be) that he, even absent from the community,
would support these actions, which is the very opposite of the picture
you paint.

Our taking effective action on our own would help show what the real
issues and intents are, and it would tell apart those who are really
interested in solving the gender imbalance and the social injustices
causing it, like you and me, from those who are abusing that flag as a
trojan horse to serve nefarious purposes, as suggested and illustrated
in https://ultralux97.medium.com/stallman-must-be-removed-a3061b09fb22


-- 
Alexandre Oliva, happy hacker  https://FSFLA.org/blogs/lxo/
   Free Software Activist         GNU Toolchain Engineer
        Vim, Vi, Voltei pro Emacs -- GNUlius Caesar

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Didier Kryn]

    I've been lurking on this list for a while but never contributed in
any way to the project. Therefore I understand my voice has little weight.

    I'm terrified by this campaign of harassment against the person who
has given the biggest contribution to free software. This confirms to my
eyes that the People *is not* the defensor of Liberty and only the law
can defend it. The success of this campaign will prove that even the
liberty to express personnal opinions seems excessive to the People.
This is how terror begins.

--     Didier

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Thomas Rodgers]

On 2021-03-26 15:53, Hi-Angel via Gcc wrote:

> Hello! I don't know all the details, and it surprises me nobody is
> asking for them. Let me be the first.
> 

A cursory reading of the top of Nathan's email states the reason for not 
including the URLs, but ~half of the cited points come from Stallman's 
own archives, which can be found at -

https://stallman.org/archive.html

And for the rest, Nathan clearly indicates where (for those skilled in 
the ways of Let Me Google That For You) to find the same information.

<... snip ...>

> (disclaimer: I'm just a random reader of the ML)

Noted.

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Hi-Angel]

Hello! I don't know all the details, and it surprises me nobody is
asking for them. Let me be the first.

On Fri, 26 Mar 2021 at 23:03, Nathan Sidwell <nathan@acm.org> wrote:
> I’m a white dude with a British accent.
> /Of course/ I have white male privilege.

So, this text makes me feel sorry for the author, but at the same time
makes it clear he is writing under some emotional burnout that he
unambiguously shown he is experiencing.

I think before making any kind of decision it would be fair to ask the
author to provide references to the points he has written below.
Because someone's career is at stake, so that kind of decision
shouldn't be done that easily, just because someone wrote that on the
internet, right? And yes, I realize that "someone" is or was a
prolific developer, but so was RMS whom we are discussing here.

We all do code-review to look for developer's mistakes, and I think
it's useful to do the same here.

So, Nathan Sidwell, could you please provide references for the
problems you mentioned below?

> In the before-time, I had heard that RMS was ‘difficult’, or ‘socially awkward’.
>   I had ignored the true toxicity he engenders. I’m sure you have too. It didn’t
> directly affect me. I didn’t need to interact with him.  I’m not a woman. It
> diminishes all of us to ignore it.
> Let me list a few of the cases I have found.  Warning, this are extremely
> offensive repugnant opinions. Mostly referenced via  geekfeminism.wikia.org. It
> didn’t take me long to find them – I should have done so sooner and for that I
> am sorry.
>      1. 'skeptical that voluntarily pedophilia harms children.’  stallman's own
>   archives 2006-mar-jun  I note that children are *incapable* of consenting.
> That’s what the age of consent means.
>      2. 'end censorship of “child pornography”’. Stallman's archives
> 2012-jul-oct.html Notice use of “quotes” to down play what is actually being
> requested.
>      3. 'gentle expressions of attraction’ Stallman's archives 2012-jul-oct.html
> Condoning a variant of the wolf-whistle.  Unless one’s talking to one’s lover,
> ‘gentle invitations for sex’ by a stranger is *grooming* (be it child or of-age).
>      4. Defends someone charged with ‘"sexual assault" on a "child" after a
> session with a sex worker of age 16.’ stallman's archives 2018-jul-oct  Notice
> the quoting here, implying the *child* is not a child. ‘The article refers to
> the sex worker as a "child", but that is not so. Elsewhere it has been published
> that she is 16 years old. That is late adolescence, not childhood.’ No, they are
> a child, that’s what the ages of majority and consent mean.
>      5. The ‘St Ignatius’ ‘EMACS virgins’ non-joke. ‘The commenter writes about
> seeing the routine when she was only 15, and how RMS singled her out several
> times during that performance:
>         He actually pointed to me in the back and proclaimed, into the mic, "A
> GIRL!" causing the audience to turn and look. Mortifying. Then he proceeded to
> gesture toward me every time he referred to "EMACS Virgins." (I cannot believe
> that he is still doing the same talk 10+ years later.)’
>         No wonder women want nothing to do with him.
>      6. A business card that is completely repelling image on oreilly
>      7. He knows those cards are inappropriate.  He broke the code of conduct he
> helped author. wiredferret's twitter feed.
>      8. I understand he’s tried to circumvent such codes of conduct by asking
> women to meet him outside of the conference venue. _sagesharp_'s twitter feed.
>      9. He doesn’t acknowledge the few women he has worked with ‘I don’t have
> any experience working with women in programming projects; I don’t think that
> any volunteered to work on Emacs or GCC.’  Completely ignoring Sandra Loosemore,
> who is a coauthor, with him, of the Glibc manual. Sandra was involved with LISP
> standardization, so I would be surprised if he was unaware of her involvement
> there. As you well know, she has worked significantly on GCC,  GCC has several
> other women contributors, but too few for complacency.
>      10. ‘My first interaction with RMS was at a hacker con at 19. He asked my
> name, I gave it, whether I went to MIT (I had an MIT shirt on), and after
> confirmation I did, asked me on a date. I said no. That was our entire
> conversation.’ corbett's twitter feed. This is but one of many reports of
> utterly inappropriate social interactions.
> That list is no where near exhaustive, nor is it prioritized. As a personal
> anecdote, an acquaintance of mine who was at MIT, related that she was warned
> about RMS’s behaviour, and to never be alone with him.  It wasn’t an isolated
> warning.

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[David Malcolm]

On Fri, 2021-03-26 at 20:51 +0000, Jonathan Wakely via Gcc wrote:
> On Fri, 26 Mar 2021, 20:03 Nathan Sidwell, <nathan@acm.org> wrote:
> 
> > 
> > Dear members of the GCC Steering Committee (SC),  I ask you to
> > remove
> > Richard
> > Stallman (RMS) from the SC, or, should you chose not to do so, make
> > a
> > clear
> > statement as to why he remains.
> > 
> 
> I second Nathan's request, and agree with everything he said.

To any observers seeing this email unfamiliar with the project, I
wanted to note that Jonathan is currently one of the most prolific
contributors to GCC, showing up as #2 on this list for commit count to
GCC over the last year, with 590 commits:
  https://www.openhub.net/p/gcc/contributors?query=&time_span=&sort=twelve_month_commits
[1]

I too second Nathan's request, and agree with what he said.

(Nathan shows up as #7 on that list, and Marek who has also replied
whilst I've been writing this shows up as #9; I'm #11 on that list).

> It's important for GCC today, and for potential future contributors.

Agreed.

I own an autographed copy of RMS's book from when I used to look up to
him, but, frankly, I think the cause of Free Software would have been
helped greatly by him taking retirement from the FSF/GNU at least a
decade ago.

I should note that I'm writing this in a personal capacity, not on
behalf of Red Hat, though FWIW Red Hat has said the following on the
matter of RMS's return to the FSF board:
https://www.redhat.com/en/blog/red-hat-statement-about-richard-stallmans-return-free-software-foundation-board


Now to get back to fixing bugs...
Dave

[1] actually the 12 month period ending 2 months ago, since that was
the last time the project was rescanned by openhub

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Mark Wielaard]

On Fri, Mar 26, 2021 at 08:51:21PM +0000, Jonathan Wakely via Gcc wrote:
> On Fri, 26 Mar 2021, 20:03 Nathan Sidwell, <nathan@acm.org> wrote:
> >
> > Dear members of the GCC Steering Committee (SC), I ask you to
> > remove Richard Stallman (RMS) from the SC, or, should you chose
> > not to do so, make a clear statement as to why he remains.
> 
> I second Nathan's request, and agree with everything he said.
> 
> It's important for GCC today, and for potential future contributors.

Thanks for starting this discussion. I agree given the recent
controversy and the long history of problematic behavior it would be
good for the Steering Committee to consider whether it still wants to
be associated with the FSF. And whether to remove or replace RMS on
the steering committee.

Thanks,

Mark

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Marek Polacek]

On Fri, Mar 26, 2021 at 04:02:30PM -0400, Nathan Sidwell wrote:
> [double sigh, attaching a pdf causes it to be blocked, and I guess the
> number of URLs is also triggering a spam trap for the follow up.  I have
> removed many of the URLS from this, you'll have to use your google-fu for
> sources.  I emailed several members of the SC, and don't want to bomb them
> with yet a third copy. ]
> 
> Dear members of the GCC Steering Committee (SC),  I ask you to remove
> Richard Stallman (RMS) from the SC, or, should you chose not to do so, make
> a clear statement as to why he remains.

[...]

> I am writing this publicly, as it is important we address the issue. In
> 2019, when RMS resigned from the FSF, I asked the SC about his status on the
> SC (the web site continued to list his affiliation as FSF).  I never saw as
> response. I failed to follow up. (FWIW, I never received a response to a
> technical licensing issue I asked in 2020. Something seems amiss.)
> In the alternative, I want you to make a definitive statement about why you
> choose not to make such a change.  Do not hide behind silence.  Silence is
> agreeing with the status quo.  Further, if you choose not to make a change,
> do not hide behind a technicality. (My understanding is that RMS has veto
> power.) The rules of the SC are not immutable laws of the universe, nor does
> humanity have immutable laws cast in stone.  The EGCS project showed that we
> can make changes with GCC’s social organization.  If we fail to do so, it
> will continue to be harder and harder to attract new talent to GCC
> development.

I support this and believe we ought to act now.

Marek

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Jonathan Wakely]

On Fri, 26 Mar 2021, 20:03 Nathan Sidwell, <nathan@acm.org> wrote:

>
> Dear members of the GCC Steering Committee (SC),  I ask you to remove
> Richard
> Stallman (RMS) from the SC, or, should you chose not to do so, make a
> clear
> statement as to why he remains.
>

I second Nathan's request, and agree with everything he said.

It's important for GCC today, and for potential future contributors.

Re: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Christopher Dimech]

What is this?  The usual rant of freaked out madness!!!

---------------------
Christopher Dimech
General Administrator - Naiad Informatics - GNU Project (Geocomputation)
- Geophysical Simulation
- Geological Subsurface Mapping
- Disaster Preparedness and Mitigation
- Natural Resource Exploration and Production
- Free Software Advocacy


> Sent: Saturday, March 27, 2021 at 8:02 AM
> From: "Nathan Sidwell" <nathan@acm.org>
> To: "GCC Development" <gcc@gcc.gnu.org>
> Subject: Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee
>
> [double sigh, attaching a pdf causes it to be blocked, and I guess the number of 
> URLs is also triggering a spam trap for the follow up.  I have removed many of 
> the URLS from this, you'll have to use your google-fu for sources.  I emailed 
> several members of the SC, and don't want to bomb them with yet a third copy. ]
> 
> Dear members of the GCC Steering Committee (SC),  I ask you to remove Richard 
> Stallman (RMS) from the SC, or, should you chose not to do so, make a clear 
> statement as to why he remains.
> 
> I am writing this publicly, as it is important we address the issue. In 2019, 
> when RMS resigned from the FSF, I asked the SC about his status on the SC (the 
> web site continued to list his affiliation as FSF).  I never saw as response. I 
> failed to follow up. (FWIW, I never received a response to a technical licensing 
> issue I asked in 2020. Something seems amiss.)
> 
> As this is public, even though I know you, the SC, know who I am, and I am lucky 
> enough to count several of you as friends, I present some bona fides:
>      • I am a long-time developer of GCC, having become involved during the EGCS 
> days of the late 1990’s.
>      • While there has been a time when I wasn’t as active as before or since, I 
> have made many thousands of commits to GCC. Particularly in the C++ Front End.
>      • You, the SC, have recognized my skills and named me as a co-maintainer of 
> the C++ Front End.
>      • In addition to the front end, I have implemented middle-end and backend 
> changes and improvements.  For instance the core of the OpenAcc execution model, 
> building on the excellent OpenMP support developed by Redhat.
>      • Outside of upstream, I have ported GCC to several architectures.  Sadly 
> several never saw the light of day, but they did pay the bills.
>      • Historically, I reimplemented the gcov coverage system, and was a 
> co-maintainer of that subsystem for some time.
>      • I implemented several pieces of the Itanium C++ ABI – the nearest thing 
> we have to a cross-platform ABI standard.
>      • I was named a maintainer of the morpho (since removed) backend, and the 
> nvidia backend originally authored by Bernd Schmidt (Tom de Vries has taken over 
> that maintainance).
>      • I’m nowhere near as prolific as other contributors, but I have been 
> fortunate enough to work on a program that is exciting and useful to so many people.
> 
> I would rather not have to write this email.  Like many developers, I just want 
> to write code. Right now we’re working towards the GCC 11 release.  I thought 
> about deferring this email. But there’s never a good time, and bad behaviour 
> needs to be addressed in the moment.  I have left this for too long already.
> 
> I used to think of GCC development as egalitarian, and therefore fair, and, by 
> assumption, welcoming. That is not true. I’m a white dude with a British accent. 
> /Of course/ I have white male privilege.  I used to joke that I fell into every 
> job I’ve had (including my doctorate) – that, right there, is white male 
> privilege.  I have so much, that I can move to a xenophobic racist country and 
> get a complete pass from the ‘immigrants are bad’ mentality. Many of you on the 
> SC have such privilege – if you don’t think such privilege affects you, /then 
> you have it/.
> 
> Just letting the code speak for itself, /is not enough/. Egalitarianism would be 
> fine in an equal world.  We do not live in that world.
> 
> 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.
> 
> Perhaps you do not see the need to attract a diverse population of developers. 
> Why do you not want to evangelize to everyone the fun it is in writing 
> compilers?  /You’re writing a program that writes programs!/ /You’re writing a 
> program that can rewrite itself to run on a different CPU!/ /How meta do you 
> want to go!?/
> 
> You cannot have missed the sparsity of women and people of color in compiler 
> engineering (kaporcenter black tech workforce).  Maybe you fallaciously put that 
> down to imbalances in education (leakytechpipeline)  How can we, the GCC 
> community, be expected to address that?  Representation matters, we’re the problem.
> 
> In the before-time, I had heard that RMS was ‘difficult’, or ‘socially awkward’. 
>   I had ignored the true toxicity he engenders. I’m sure you have too. It didn’t 
> directly affect me. I didn’t need to interact with him.  I’m not a woman. It 
> diminishes all of us to ignore it.
> Let me list a few of the cases I have found.  Warning, this are extremely 
> offensive repugnant opinions. Mostly referenced via  geekfeminism.wikia.org. It 
> didn’t take me long to find them – I should have done so sooner and for that I 
> am sorry.
>      1. 'skeptical that voluntarily pedophilia harms children.’  stallman's own 
>   archives 2006-mar-jun  I note that children are *incapable* of consenting. 
> That’s what the age of consent means.
>      2. 'end censorship of “child pornography”’. Stallman's archives 
> 2012-jul-oct.html Notice use of “quotes” to down play what is actually being 
> requested.
>      3. 'gentle expressions of attraction’ Stallman's archives 2012-jul-oct.html 
> Condoning a variant of the wolf-whistle.  Unless one’s talking to one’s lover, 
> ‘gentle invitations for sex’ by a stranger is *grooming* (be it child or of-age).
>      4. Defends someone charged with ‘"sexual assault" on a "child" after a 
> session with a sex worker of age 16.’ stallman's archives 2018-jul-oct  Notice 
> the quoting here, implying the *child* is not a child. ‘The article refers to 
> the sex worker as a "child", but that is not so. Elsewhere it has been published 
> that she is 16 years old. That is late adolescence, not childhood.’ No, they are 
> a child, that’s what the ages of majority and consent mean.
>      5. The ‘St Ignatius’ ‘EMACS virgins’ non-joke. ‘The commenter writes about 
> seeing the routine when she was only 15, and how RMS singled her out several 
> times during that performance:
>         He actually pointed to me in the back and proclaimed, into the mic, "A 
> GIRL!" causing the audience to turn and look. Mortifying. Then he proceeded to 
> gesture toward me every time he referred to "EMACS Virgins." (I cannot believe 
> that he is still doing the same talk 10+ years later.)’
>         No wonder women want nothing to do with him.
>      6. A business card that is completely repelling image on oreilly
>      7. He knows those cards are inappropriate.  He broke the code of conduct he 
> helped author. wiredferret's twitter feed.
>      8. I understand he’s tried to circumvent such codes of conduct by asking 
> women to meet him outside of the conference venue. _sagesharp_'s twitter feed.
>      9. He doesn’t acknowledge the few women he has worked with ‘I don’t have 
> any experience working with women in programming projects; I don’t think that 
> any volunteered to work on Emacs or GCC.’  Completely ignoring Sandra Loosemore, 
> who is a coauthor, with him, of the Glibc manual. Sandra was involved with LISP 
> standardization, so I would be surprised if he was unaware of her involvement 
> there. As you well know, she has worked significantly on GCC,  GCC has several 
> other women contributors, but too few for complacency.
>      10. ‘My first interaction with RMS was at a hacker con at 19. He asked my 
> name, I gave it, whether I went to MIT (I had an MIT shirt on), and after 
> confirmation I did, asked me on a date. I said no. That was our entire 
> conversation.’ corbett's twitter feed. This is but one of many reports of 
> utterly inappropriate social interactions.
> That list is no where near exhaustive, nor is it prioritized. As a personal 
> anecdote, an acquaintance of mine who was at MIT, related that she was warned 
> about RMS’s behaviour, and to never be alone with him.  It wasn’t an isolated 
> warning.
> 
> Perhaps you’ll discount these as hearsay, or construct a rationale that the 
> reporter was misinterpreting intent or something.  This is not a court of law. 
> So many are pointing in the same direction that you cannot ignore the 
> implication.  Perhaps you’ll claim my request is ‘cancel culture’.  That is the 
> cry of the hypocrite – this is ‘actions have consequences’.  While I know 
> neither you nor RMS will make a fallacious ‘but my rights’ accusation, others 
> may.  The USA is not the world and the SC is not the US government.  For those 
> in the USA, the (inapplicable) first amendment provides 5 rights, including 
> showing an unwelcome guest the door.
> 
> The GCC web site mentions that SC membership is a /personal membership/:
> 
> ‘Membership in the steering committee is a personal membership. Affiliations are 
> listed for identification purposes only; steering committee members do not 
> represent their employers or academic institutions. Generally speaking, 
> committee members were chosen to represent the interests of communities (e.g. 
> Fortran users, embedded systems developers, kernel hackers), not companies.’		 
> gcc website steering committee
> Thus, /you/, the SC members are each personally endorsing RMS via his SC 
> membership. At best, /you/ are saying that his behaviour is not a hindrance to 
> GCC’s mission.  At worse, /you/ are saying his behaviour is acceptable.  By 
> accepting RMS on the SC, /we/, the GCC developer community, are saying the same. 
> We should think about that.
> 
> 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.
> 
> 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.
> 
> I am asking you to make a positive move towards more inclusivity and diversity. 
> Perhaps you don’t think that is important – we’re about the code.  That’s a 
> privileged view point. The other popular open source compiler has a much more 
> inclusive community, and its conferences are a joy because of that.  And they 
> put paid to the fallacious argument that women ‘just don’t like compilers’ – 
> what rot!
> 
> My current workplace is a joy because of the huge step towards gender equality 
> amongst the engineers.  You might not realize how enlightening that is without 
> experiencing it. (And yes, it could be better.)
> 
> In the alternative, I want you to make a definitive statement about why you 
> choose not to make such a change.  Do not hide behind silence.  Silence is 
> agreeing with the status quo.  Further, if you choose not to make a change, do 
> not hide behind a technicality. (My understanding is that RMS has veto power.) 
> The rules of the SC are not immutable laws of the universe, nor does humanity 
> have immutable laws cast in stone.  The EGCS project showed that we can make 
> changes with GCC’s social organization.  If we fail to do so, it will continue 
> to be harder and harder to attract new talent to GCC development.
> 
> Address this as a priority. Address it now.
> -- 
> Nathan Sidwell
>

Remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee

[Nathan Sidwell]

[double sigh, attaching a pdf causes it to be blocked, and I guess the number of 
URLs is also triggering a spam trap for the follow up.  I have removed many of 
the URLS from this, you'll have to use your google-fu for sources.  I emailed 
several members of the SC, and don't want to bomb them with yet a third copy. ]

Dear members of the GCC Steering Committee (SC),  I ask you to remove Richard 
Stallman (RMS) from the SC, or, should you chose not to do so, make a clear 
statement as to why he remains.

I am writing this publicly, as it is important we address the issue. In 2019, 
when RMS resigned from the FSF, I asked the SC about his status on the SC (the 
web site continued to list his affiliation as FSF).  I never saw as response. I 
failed to follow up. (FWIW, I never received a response to a technical licensing 
issue I asked in 2020. Something seems amiss.)

As this is public, even though I know you, the SC, know who I am, and I am lucky 
enough to count several of you as friends, I present some bona fides:
     • I am a long-time developer of GCC, having become involved during the EGCS 
days of the late 1990’s.
     • While there has been a time when I wasn’t as active as before or since, I 
have made many thousands of commits to GCC. Particularly in the C++ Front End.
     • You, the SC, have recognized my skills and named me as a co-maintainer of 
the C++ Front End.
     • In addition to the front end, I have implemented middle-end and backend 
changes and improvements.  For instance the core of the OpenAcc execution model, 
building on the excellent OpenMP support developed by Redhat.
     • Outside of upstream, I have ported GCC to several architectures.  Sadly 
several never saw the light of day, but they did pay the bills.
     • Historically, I reimplemented the gcov coverage system, and was a 
co-maintainer of that subsystem for some time.
     • I implemented several pieces of the Itanium C++ ABI – the nearest thing 
we have to a cross-platform ABI standard.
     • I was named a maintainer of the morpho (since removed) backend, and the 
nvidia backend originally authored by Bernd Schmidt (Tom de Vries has taken over 
that maintainance).
     • I’m nowhere near as prolific as other contributors, but I have been 
fortunate enough to work on a program that is exciting and useful to so many people.

I would rather not have to write this email.  Like many developers, I just want 
to write code. Right now we’re working towards the GCC 11 release.  I thought 
about deferring this email. But there’s never a good time, and bad behaviour 
needs to be addressed in the moment.  I have left this for too long already.

I used to think of GCC development as egalitarian, and therefore fair, and, by 
assumption, welcoming. That is not true. I’m a white dude with a British accent. 
/Of course/ I have white male privilege.  I used to joke that I fell into every 
job I’ve had (including my doctorate) – that, right there, is white male 
privilege.  I have so much, that I can move to a xenophobic racist country and 
get a complete pass from the ‘immigrants are bad’ mentality. Many of you on the 
SC have such privilege – if you don’t think such privilege affects you, /then 
you have it/.

Just letting the code speak for itself, /is not enough/. Egalitarianism would be 
fine in an equal world.  We do not live in that world.

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.

Perhaps you do not see the need to attract a diverse population of developers. 
Why do you not want to evangelize to everyone the fun it is in writing 
compilers?  /You’re writing a program that writes programs!/ /You’re writing a 
program that can rewrite itself to run on a different CPU!/ /How meta do you 
want to go!?/

You cannot have missed the sparsity of women and people of color in compiler 
engineering (kaporcenter black tech workforce).  Maybe you fallaciously put that 
down to imbalances in education (leakytechpipeline)  How can we, the GCC 
community, be expected to address that?  Representation matters, we’re the problem.

In the before-time, I had heard that RMS was ‘difficult’, or ‘socially awkward’. 
  I had ignored the true toxicity he engenders. I’m sure you have too. It didn’t 
directly affect me. I didn’t need to interact with him.  I’m not a woman. It 
diminishes all of us to ignore it.
Let me list a few of the cases I have found.  Warning, this are extremely 
offensive repugnant opinions. Mostly referenced via  geekfeminism.wikia.org. It 
didn’t take me long to find them – I should have done so sooner and for that I 
am sorry.
     1. 'skeptical that voluntarily pedophilia harms children.’  stallman's own 
  archives 2006-mar-jun  I note that children are *incapable* of consenting. 
That’s what the age of consent means.
     2. 'end censorship of “child pornography”’. Stallman's archives 
2012-jul-oct.html Notice use of “quotes” to down play what is actually being 
requested.
     3. 'gentle expressions of attraction’ Stallman's archives 2012-jul-oct.html 
Condoning a variant of the wolf-whistle.  Unless one’s talking to one’s lover, 
‘gentle invitations for sex’ by a stranger is *grooming* (be it child or of-age).
     4. Defends someone charged with ‘"sexual assault" on a "child" after a 
session with a sex worker of age 16.’ stallman's archives 2018-jul-oct  Notice 
the quoting here, implying the *child* is not a child. ‘The article refers to 
the sex worker as a "child", but that is not so. Elsewhere it has been published 
that she is 16 years old. That is late adolescence, not childhood.’ No, they are 
a child, that’s what the ages of majority and consent mean.
     5. The ‘St Ignatius’ ‘EMACS virgins’ non-joke. ‘The commenter writes about 
seeing the routine when she was only 15, and how RMS singled her out several 
times during that performance:
        He actually pointed to me in the back and proclaimed, into the mic, "A 
GIRL!" causing the audience to turn and look. Mortifying. Then he proceeded to 
gesture toward me every time he referred to "EMACS Virgins." (I cannot believe 
that he is still doing the same talk 10+ years later.)’
        No wonder women want nothing to do with him.
     6. A business card that is completely repelling image on oreilly
     7. He knows those cards are inappropriate.  He broke the code of conduct he 
helped author. wiredferret's twitter feed.
     8. I understand he’s tried to circumvent such codes of conduct by asking 
women to meet him outside of the conference venue. _sagesharp_'s twitter feed.
     9. He doesn’t acknowledge the few women he has worked with ‘I don’t have 
any experience working with women in programming projects; I don’t think that 
any volunteered to work on Emacs or GCC.’  Completely ignoring Sandra Loosemore, 
who is a coauthor, with him, of the Glibc manual. Sandra was involved with LISP 
standardization, so I would be surprised if he was unaware of her involvement 
there. As you well know, she has worked significantly on GCC,  GCC has several 
other women contributors, but too few for complacency.
     10. ‘My first interaction with RMS was at a hacker con at 19. He asked my 
name, I gave it, whether I went to MIT (I had an MIT shirt on), and after 
confirmation I did, asked me on a date. I said no. That was our entire 
conversation.’ corbett's twitter feed. This is but one of many reports of 
utterly inappropriate social interactions.
That list is no where near exhaustive, nor is it prioritized. As a personal 
anecdote, an acquaintance of mine who was at MIT, related that she was warned 
about RMS’s behaviour, and to never be alone with him.  It wasn’t an isolated 
warning.

Perhaps you’ll discount these as hearsay, or construct a rationale that the 
reporter was misinterpreting intent or something.  This is not a court of law. 
So many are pointing in the same direction that you cannot ignore the 
implication.  Perhaps you’ll claim my request is ‘cancel culture’.  That is the 
cry of the hypocrite – this is ‘actions have consequences’.  While I know 
neither you nor RMS will make a fallacious ‘but my rights’ accusation, others 
may.  The USA is not the world and the SC is not the US government.  For those 
in the USA, the (inapplicable) first amendment provides 5 rights, including 
showing an unwelcome guest the door.

The GCC web site mentions that SC membership is a /personal membership/:

‘Membership in the steering committee is a personal membership. Affiliations are 
listed for identification purposes only; steering committee members do not 
represent their employers or academic institutions. Generally speaking, 
committee members were chosen to represent the interests of communities (e.g. 
Fortran users, embedded systems developers, kernel hackers), not companies.’		 
gcc website steering committee
Thus, /you/, the SC members are each personally endorsing RMS via his SC 
membership. At best, /you/ are saying that his behaviour is not a hindrance to 
GCC’s mission.  At worse, /you/ are saying his behaviour is acceptable.  By 
accepting RMS on the SC, /we/, the GCC developer community, are saying the same. 
We should think about that.

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.

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.

I am asking you to make a positive move towards more inclusivity and diversity. 
Perhaps you don’t think that is important – we’re about the code.  That’s a 
privileged view point. The other popular open source compiler has a much more 
inclusive community, and its conferences are a joy because of that.  And they 
put paid to the fallacious argument that women ‘just don’t like compilers’ – 
what rot!

My current workplace is a joy because of the huge step towards gender equality 
amongst the engineers.  You might not realize how enlightening that is without 
experiencing it. (And yes, it could be better.)

In the alternative, I want you to make a definitive statement about why you 
choose not to make such a change.  Do not hide behind silence.  Silence is 
agreeing with the status quo.  Further, if you choose not to make a change, do 
not hide behind a technicality. (My understanding is that RMS has veto power.) 
The rules of the SC are not immutable laws of the universe, nor does humanity 
have immutable laws cast in stone.  The EGCS project showed that we can make 
changes with GCC’s social organization.  If we fail to do so, it will continue 
to be harder and harder to attract new talent to GCC development.

Address this as a priority. Address it now.
-- 
Nathan Sidwell