Re: You rate savannah.gnu.org at A? AYFKM?

[Richard Stallman]

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  > > We are persistently miscommunicating.
  > > They are not movements as I understand the word.
  > > You're using a much looser definition of "movement".

  > Then your understanding contradicts 2 major dictionaries of American 
  > English:

Merriam-Webster definition 2b cites the civil rights movement and the
movement to increase the minimum wage.  The way a movement like that
starts is that one or more people stand up and say, "Let's demand this
and fight for it" and then others join in.  That's what I did, for
free software.

Meaning 2a is a valid usage of the word "movement" but it is not
the meaning we mean.

  > > The free software movement is a campaign for a moral goal:

  > No. As long as you consider it acceptable to throw some people under the 
  > bus,

We are not doing anything like that to anyone.  What we are in fact
doing is setting priorities.  We give respect for software freedom,
for all users, top priority.  We also advocate implementing
accessibility for minorities of users, but we have good reasons to
give that lower priority.

         as long as you call not doing that a "feature",

I don't think we ever said that.

  > "Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere" (Martin Luther 
  > King). Since you consider acceptable to perpetuate an injustice (and 
  > arguably reinforce it, by giving it another stronghold), your approach 
  > is flawed to the core, and you're defending the indefensible.

King was talking about the ultimate goal, which covers every injustice
to anyone.  For us, that is level A+.

With limited means, we can't simply demand that people correct
everything that is bad.  Especially those things, the correction of
which might require lots of work.

  > > Compare with the civil rights movement,
  > > the environmental movement, etc.

  > Or the disability rights movement, perhaps?

Yes, exactly.  The disability rights movement is a moral movement
because the nature of its goal is about an issue of justice.

If people said, "We should make every site accessible to people with
disabilities so as to make production more efficient," that would not
be a moral movement.  But when people say said, "We should make every
site accessible to people with disabilities _because that is just_,"
it is a moral movement.

Saying that something is a moral movement does not imply agreeing with
it.  But I do agree with the disability rights movement.

There are many moral movements I support.  There are limits to what
I can do for them.  I've decided to give the disability rights movement
some support in GNU, but we have to prioritize.

  > Then, since you happily ignore and perpetuate one wrong

Please do not exaggerate.  We do not perpetuate it, and we certainly
do not ignore it.

                                                            while claiming 
  > to fight to end another, you're not fighting to end wrongs, plural.

That's right.  Ending all wrongs would be a bite bigger than we can
chew.  Here in the free software movement, we work to end one kind of
wrong, one that hits around 1/3 of the human population.

I personally try to help against other wrongs on the side.

  > Have you read the URL I pointed you to earlier?

I have no idea.  You have shown me many URLs, and I don't have time to
figure out which one you mean now.

  > So what does that make "we're perfectly happy doing nasty practice X", 
  > where X is discriminating against people with disabilities?

That makes it a stance that isn't our stance.

-- 
Dr Richard Stallman (https://stallman.org)
Chief GNUisance of the GNU Project (https://gnu.org)
Founder, Free Software Foundation (https://fsf.org)
Internet Hall-of-Famer (https://internethalloffame.org)