[Previous entry: "20 years of USENET"] [Next entry: "HTML O' the day"]

12/01/2005: "A public apology to Russ Nelson"

OK, that was wrong and mean. Nelson isn't racist, and apparently this kind of thing upsets him. A lot.

I formally and publicly apologise, but I think Nelson's post (which appears to have been removed) and followups to that post show that he doesn't understand how his arguement is taken to be racist, even though it was proposed as an arguement against racism.

Lets read his retraction Blacks are lazy?:

I expect that everyone has heard the "Blacks are lazy" slander. I think a single economic principle has two aspects that may explain its genesis: if everything else is the same, people will prefer leisure to work. In other words, everyone is lazy. So why do blacks get picked on? Two reasons: First, racism rewards blacks less for work, giving them less incentive to work hard. Second, that the difference between the work output of a slave versus the same person as a freedman could be perceived as laziness. Even the smallest effect would be picked up by a racist looking for reasons to hate blacks.

I think Nelson's arguement that blacks are lazy because they are paid less (above) is fundamentally flawed. I don't prefer leisure to work, and I know a lot of others like me. At this point I don't have to work, but I do, and I've typically been found to work far harder and longer than is "required". I don't work for monetary renumeration. I find the rewards of work elsewhere. I believe that most of us require some level of salary, but Nelson's arguement says that we will work hardest for a party that pays us the most wages. For those of you still performing salary reivews, its been my belief for a long time that a lack of salary can serve as a disincentive, but a surplus of salary does not act as an incentive for more output or engagement. I can also say with certainty that Microsoft couldn't hire me for $500K/year, but, were it not for the wife and kid, I'd join the FSF and work there for less than $50k/year. I'm sure I'd learn more at the FSF, and thats the difference.

To use a current example of similar vices, Tom Cruise and many other Scientologist are on a tear against psychaiatry. Not psycology, mind you, psychaiatry, the one that requires that first you become a physician, then undergo years of residency. The Scientologists formally claim that there is no science in psychaiatry. That there is no such thing as "chemical inbalance" in the body or brain. Now, its potentially quite true that drugs, including drugs used in psychaiatry, are over-prescribed, especially in the US. But many people actually need these treatments in order to function, and in some ways society is better for the presence of these treatments and drugs. Sound bytes like those used by Scientologists that there is, "no science in psycaiatry" are harmful in exactly the way that Nelson's accusation that racism removes the incentive to pay blacks wha they deserve isharmfull. They reduce a very complex subject to a single thought.

Nelson's attack on raciscm, stating that it yeilds lower wages for blacks because it removes the incentive for blacks to work is not only wrong, it harms blacks, and thereby harms society. His remarks are therefore judged "racist" by many readers both by their nature and result.

Further, Nelson's use of racially-loaded words like "slave" while referring to the black population shows an extreme lack of sensitivity toward how blacks feel about those words, and his insinuation that because they are black, becaues they are subject to racisim, a force they can not control, they work less, and are therefore paid less.

Raymond has the same problem with his remarks about homosexuality. Raymond potends that words are not harmful if there was no intent to harm, while any human in society can attest to the lack of truth in that line of thinking. At least Nelson offered an apoloiga when his words were found to offend, and he lost something precious as a result. Raymond has offered none.

I'm not above having said things in poor taste which were taken as racism in my past. (Even though I was deliberately shipped across town on a bus from 2nd thru 4th grade in order to attend the equivalent of a "charter" school, so I could use and develop my intellect, and ended up with many black friends. In one infamous incident, the presence of my friends from school precluded the presence of my (white) neighborhood friends at one of my birthday parties. The parents of my friends in my neighborhood would not allow thier children to 'mix'.) You would think I'd be sensitive after a history with many similar incidents. Yet back in 1989 or 1990, I blasted (via a widely circulated email) Sun's decision to give its employees a holiday on MLK's birthday. I complained that as a company and nation, we only celibrate the birth of one other man, a guy named Jesus Christ, and that I didn't think the two men were equal. I allowed that I would be satisfied if we celibrated a "Civil Rights Day" which happened to occur on January 17. I found myself defending my words in front of HR the next day. I wasn't fired, and I wasn't threatened with being fired, but I did learn something, not so much from the lectured that HR delivered (if I recall, I was more than smug), but from the response I got from fellow employees at Sun. Some wondered why I was complaining about a day off, but others took the time to explain what I had done, and how it was viewed.

I had made a true statement, 100% based in logic, but it was insensitive in the extreme, and I was wrong for making it. In a similar way, I am wrong for having called Nelson "a racist". He's not. He wrote something stupid and paid a price, and apparently even now still finds himself attacked when he only wants to put it behind him. I'll repeat one last time, I was wrong for calling Nelson a racist.

My (mostly unvoiced) concern with OSI is that, becaue they are a committee, committee politics with take hold and flourish, and the vision of "Open Source"' will be lost, especially as OSI is tempted to pander to Microsoft's demands (which will be subtle at first.) OSI claims it decided (as a board) in April (though ESR claims Feb) to remove the anti-Microsoft documents, but has never adequately explained the driver for this decision, nor has it explained why the documents were not removed until October, only one day before Microsoft "announced" its new "open source compatible" license(s).

For this, Russ labeled me "paranoid", and said I should be ignored. While its true that Microsoft is not evil, and I agree that there are people inside Microsoft who want to change its behavior and methods, the people who run the company, and are responsible to its shareholders, can only be described as vehemently hostile to the idea and ideals of software freedom.

At some point during our back-and-forth email Nelson stated, "Freedom is good."

My response was, "Yes, and Freedom is the point. Moreover, "Open source" != Software Freedom." A lot of Raymond's rhetoric at starting the "open source" movement was directed at exactly this premise, first because the word "free" was somehow confusing for business, and later because Raymond belives that Software Freedom is encouraged only by "anti-propertarians" and socialists.

Nelson's response was simply this:

"Freedom is the point. Open Source is Software Freedom. Anybody who says otherwise is trying to split up the movements so they may be more easily defeated. In union there is strength."

Hmm, "Freedom is the point. Open Source is Software Freedom." strongly echos
Bruce Peren's recent UN speech, lampooned here and
here contained this:

“I am honored to follow Doctor Richard Stallman, the giant upon whose shoulders Open Source stands. When I say Open Source, I mean the same thing that Richard means when he says Free Software. There has been factionalism, but only because of personalities that no longer matter.” - Bruce Perens, UN World Summit on the Information Society Speech.

I would be really glad if "Open Source Initiative" publicly repeated Nelson's words clearly and strongly. It would greatly help the campaign for software freedom. I'm sure Stallman would be very happy were this to occur as well.

The ball seems to be in OSI's court.