RMS was ousted for for publicly endorsing sexism. I never met him or was involved in the free software cultural scene outside of just the software, but even I knew that he was at least “sexually non-conformist” which is a weird thing to know about someone who writes software halfway across the country. And he still wouldn’t have been “cancelled” if he wasn’t also dumb enough to start publicly talking sexist nonsense in the midst of the #metoo movement.
Linus was in trouble for being verbally abusive and hostile but he appears to understand the problems he causes and tried to improve.
I don’t see how ESR’s position on guns, which AFAIK is “I like guns” is going to get him in trouble. Despite what you may hear on fox news, that isn’t how things work. Just liking guns and thinking they should be legal is definitely something I disagree with, but its when people start shouting racist and sexist nonsense is when they get in trouble. There just seems to be a large overlap between people who like guns and people who like to use guns to threaten Black people. His comments on women in tech, gay rights, and police brutality on the other hand definitely could get him in trouble, but at least he isn’t tweeting racists statements at BLM activists, so even if he believes that he is apparently at least smarter than RMS.
But the real point is, it is possible for someone to have outstanding technical accomplishments but still be an offensive asshole. That doesn’t negate the value of their technical accomplishments, but their technical accomplishments do not excuse their offensive behavior. And at the very least, that means they should not be in leadership positions whether official or unofficial. Because to be an effective leader you need to be able to trust and be trusted by the people you lead even when they are Black, women, gay, trans, etc. If you can’t do that, you are a bad leader regardless of your technical skills.
Another inconvenient fact that is often hidden in these discussions. If you go into any company or organization you will find that there are people who are technically brilliant but are abusive arrogant assholes – just not necessarily on a racial or sexist basis. And when they get put into leadership positions it causes lots of problems. But because these problems are felt by white men as well as women and people of color, they get fixed (at least in halfway competent organizations). The asshole is reorganized to not have that kind of direct authority, closely monitored by their superiors or HR, fired, or encouraged to leave or retire. Even founders are often relegated to advisory roles if they can’t effectively lead white men. But when they only target women and minorities, it gets overlooked or swept under the rug because “that’s just his way, but he is so smart” Until it gets made public, and then there is an outcry about cancel culture.
