Re: [libreplanet-discuss] open letter to the Community:

[Aaron Wolf]

On 2/14/19 2:54 PM, Lyberta wrote:
> John Sullivan:
>> Greg Farough <gregf@riseup.net> writes:
>>
>>> Let's not even joke about suicide or doing violence to people who use the 
>>> wrong kind of computer program.
>>>
>>
>> Agreed, and let's let this thread drop. Lyberta is now on moderation,
>> and I'll reach out to them further.
>>
>> -john
>>
> 
> What joking? I wasn't joking. People who create proprietary software
> drive me and other people to suicide. It's a fact. When the only safe
> place on Earth is your PC and the only thing that keeps you sane is
> software, you see that proprietary software strips the last bits of
> happiness from you. Free software saves lives, proprietary software
> literally kills people.
> 
> 


But that rhetoric has no tie to any particular philosophy or perspective
otherwise. Any situation where someone gets into caring about something
and threatens (or even commits) suicide because of something in the
world going in a way they don't prefer… that can be used to justify any
position at all, depending on how real it is. In any situation that
isn't just a total anomaly, we can jump to the reasons behind the
suicide threat and they will be compelling enough. Using the
suicide-threat itself is never justified.

There's even a phenomenon of copycat-suicide where focusing on the
righteousness of a suicide victim can encourage more people to commit
suicide.

So, please stay on the focus of what the direct harms are and not on the
extreme reactions that people suffering harms might have.

signature.asc
Description: OpenPGP digital signature