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" <nat...@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 >
