Michel Bauwens wrote:
On Thu, Nov 24, 2011 at 9:31 PM, Christian Siefkes <[email protected]>wrote:
Would you work with the Ku Klux Klan if it could help foster your goals? Where do you draw the line?
good question, I would draw the line with explicitely 'anti-p2p' forces such as racism, genderism, etc ..
Yes, that sounds reasonable. Peer production requires treating others as your peers, as equals, and anybody with racist, homophobic, sexist, anti-semitic views won't be able to do that, hence their participation is likely do to more bad than good. Anti-abortion is about denying women's right over their own bodies (while, of course, men's rights over their bodies are never put in doubt), hence it is equally 'anti-p2p'.
a question for you: if you are working on a piece of free software, and you discover your co-developer is KKK, would you stop working with her?
these are by no means easy questions, FLOSS is full of libertarians, whose values I object to ...
I know. Eric Raymond's pro-gun standpoint and some of his possible more-or-less racists sayings haven't stopped me from quoting his insights about free software. Some time ago I discovered that the author of a little piece of free software I'm using has shockingly right-wing views: http://www.fourmilab.ch/documents/enemies/ . That didn't stop me from using his software, nor from contributing a little patch back to him, of course. So I don't think people having personal views contrary to my own is a problem as long as it doesn't hinder cooperation in a project. But on the other hand I would think it very wrong to invite people with such standpoints precisely *because of* their standpoints -- which is what anybody who talks about "building an alliance with the Tea Party" is proposing to do. And, of course, if (say) an openly racist person's participation in a project would cause black people to leave to product, or discourage them from joining it, since they could feel no longer welcome, then it would be the racist who would have to leave so as to correct the situation. I hope we agree on that?
what do you think of nader's alliance with ron paul, around the 3 priorities of ending the war, ending the war on drugs and 3 ??
"and 3"? Ending wars, and ending the war on drugs are fine goals, and it seems to me that Ron Paul is by far not the worst of the Tea Party--near candidates currently running. Nevertheless I suppose that such alliances will ultimately do more bad than good, since they will increase acceptance for causes that are anti-emancipatory and 'anti-p2p'. Best regards Christian -- |------- Dr. Christian Siefkes ------- [email protected] ------- | Homepage: http://www.siefkes.net/ | Blog: http://www.keimform.de/ | Peer Production Everywhere: http://peerconomy.org/wiki/ |---------------------------------- OpenPGP Key ID: 0x346452D8 -- It is only the identification of a Them that makes it possible for us to live with the epidemic of Aids in Africa or the death of thousands of children each day from curable diseases. The existence of capitalism is conceivable only on the basis of the dulling of our feelings ... that enables us to erect private morality into a wall to keep out the pain of the world.... Communism is the movement of intensity against the dulling of feeling that makes the horrors of capitalism possible. -- John Holloway, Change the World Without Taking Power