> there are certain discussions you just cannot have
The way I look at this is through responsibility. It's like what we learned in Spiderman, "With great power, comes great responsibility."
So it's not that Stallman can't have this conversation anywhere. It's that when he has it so publicly, it makes people question whether he is wielding his power well.
Sometimes responsibility means not saying anything at all. Presumably, Stallman is at MIT for computer science and free software. Why is he speaking off topic to MIT students and alum? Presumably he could develop non-MIT relationships and have whatever crazy conversations he wanted.
More often, I think the responsibility is just to do a lot more work. If you're famous and you speak off the cuff on topics that you haven't researched, then your comments get a reach that's undeserved. It's a misapplication of your fame.
I thought that about PGs most recent luggage comments. This is something that had an answer that he could look up and share with people. Or if that's too hard, he could have gotten a thorough answer privately. Seeing him be so willfully and publicly ignorant made me question whether he deserved the power that comes with fame. Laziness like that is diminishing and eventually it gets to the point where people are so diminished that they should lose their jobs and/or positions of authority.
The way I look at this is through responsibility. It's like what we learned in Spiderman, "With great power, comes great responsibility."
So it's not that Stallman can't have this conversation anywhere. It's that when he has it so publicly, it makes people question whether he is wielding his power well.
Sometimes responsibility means not saying anything at all. Presumably, Stallman is at MIT for computer science and free software. Why is he speaking off topic to MIT students and alum? Presumably he could develop non-MIT relationships and have whatever crazy conversations he wanted.
More often, I think the responsibility is just to do a lot more work. If you're famous and you speak off the cuff on topics that you haven't researched, then your comments get a reach that's undeserved. It's a misapplication of your fame.
I thought that about PGs most recent luggage comments. This is something that had an answer that he could look up and share with people. Or if that's too hard, he could have gotten a thorough answer privately. Seeing him be so willfully and publicly ignorant made me question whether he deserved the power that comes with fame. Laziness like that is diminishing and eventually it gets to the point where people are so diminished that they should lose their jobs and/or positions of authority.