Get Rid of the Gross, Bad Apples
RICHARD STALLMAN was forced to re sign from MIT and the Free Software Foundation (FSF) after criticism regarding his defense of Jeffery Epstein. It wasn’t the first time he’d made questionable statements. And his isn’t the only instance of toxic behavior in the open-source world.
One of the biggest criticisms of technology as an industry is the proliferation of misogynistic and toxic behavior among its ranks. It may be easy to point fingers at Big Tech, but there are bad elements in open source as well. One of the biggest names, Richard Stallman, resigned from his position at the Free Software Foundation and his post at MIT after statements he made defending Jeffrey Epstein from accusations of rape and sex trafficking.
As someone who always thought of Stallman as a prophet of free software, I was surprised to learn about his statements. What disturbed me more was that he has a long history of defending pedophilia and child pornography. Reading some of his old blog posts, it doesn’t get better.
While Stallman is an extreme case, Linus Torvalds was also the subject of criticism over behavior. Torvalds took time off from being the head of the Linux kernel project after outrage over his treatment of code contributors. He would publicly shame and curse-out developers who committed code that he found to be bad.
Putting aside details, the problems in the online open-source community stem from a history of being made up of mostly nerdy, white males. While there is nothing wrong with being a nerd or white (or both), there is something to be said about being in a community that lacks a diversity of voices. The toxic masculinity, misogyny, and racism I saw in the Marine Corps was also a product of the infantry being exclusively male. It doesn’t surprise me that such individuals also exist in a community long dominated by men.
There’s now lots more diversity in the open-source community. It’s a minority of members who express views or create posts that are offensive and off-putting. People who head projects are in de facto positions of power, and the larger the project, the more powerful and influential the project leads. The behavior of leaders in open source ought to be subject to scrutiny, just as someone who holds a leadership role in government should be. Likewise, leadership in open source should take care to represent the wide diversity of users, developers, and community members.
Diversity anywhere results in better outcomes. Women have unique world views and concerns men might never consider. The LGBTQ community can bring unique perspectives on privacy and gender use in interfaces. People of color or differing socioeconomic status may be more aware of the barriers and challenges that disadvantaged communities face. Newer contributors may have good “stupid” questions that might go overlooked by older developers, while older developers bring experience that can be levied to mentor newer programmers. Bringing those views into how projects are designed, documented, and presented to the public is important.
The fact someone writes good code doesn’t make them unassailable as a person. If free and open-source software is meant to free the user, one must ensure that the diversity of users is represented and respected, and that the developers have a grounding in morals and ethics.
While it is good and proper that Stallman resigned, his remarks still leave a stain on MIT and the FSF that will take time to fully cleanse. Every Linux user relies on GNU code that Stallman helped produce. For me, I can appreciate his contributions to open source while demanding better from people in the community.
The fact someone writes good code doesn’t make them unassailable as a person.