Re: [Fsfe-uk] Just a Minute

[Nick Mailer]

On Mon, Apr 15, 2002 at 07:58:25PM +0100, Martin Coxall wrote:
> > If you think the AFFS is about some general fight for freedom, then
> > you're wrong.  It is specifically about having an organisation aimed
> > specifically at promoting Free Software, as was laid down at the initial
> > meeting, and the constitution.   If you feel that there should be a more
> > widely focused group, feel free to set one up, and I might even join it.
> 
> I am saying I think this should be the more widely-focused group. Since
> free software is a symptom of a free society, our first duty should be
> to freedom where it affects the free software environment, for it is
> only in that capacity that free software can flourish.
> 

Perhaps this all needs to be stated as a set of simple syllogisms? Or
maybe just an old fashioned logic train. People seem to be making a
meal out of something that seems to me simply to be an incorrigibly
valid and true argument.

1) The AFFS exists to promote Free Software.
2) There exist legal and political entities whose domains of discourse
include but are not restricted to the production of Free Software
3) A necessary condition for the continued viability of Free Software is
that its production remains compatible with the relevant areas of
those afformentioned domains of discourse.

Ergo, a failure to engage with said legal and political entities is a
failure to to promote Free Software, and the AFFS fails to fulfil the
first article of its constitution.


So those who would argue that the AFFS should "focus on free software
but leave the broader political issues for others" clearly either does
not agree with or does not understand the AFFS's remit at anything other 
than a speciously superficial level.