Re: [ox-en] Nazi in Debian Alert
- From: Paul Bowman <helvetius ntlworld.com>
- Date: Fri, 23 Jan 2004 15:27:39 +0000
Robin Green wrote:
Well, that's unfortunate, but if the Debian developers don't want to eject
him, what can you do?
Inform people.
I mean, it's not as if Walther is using his position to promote Nazi
ideology is it - or is it?
I don't have sufficient information to properly answer that. People
within the Debian developers group
would have a better idea, but they seem to have clammed up...
It's a tough one for free software communities, because what would you
have them do? Stop accepting contributions from him, for example? OK,
but then they're fragmenting the development of free softare and/or
slowing it down. Is it really worth doing that, chucking away his
contributions just because he happens to be a Nazi? As long as his
contributions aren't actually promoting Nazism in any way shape or
form, it seems like a waste to reject them.
My initial response was predicated on our (Leeds AFA) "prime directive"
- the personal security of
individuals must take priority - never withold information that relates
to/affects/compromises individual's
personal security from them, regardless. Would that all players in the
UK antifa "area" operated under
the same principle (Searchlight, for e.g., do not, which has
historically been at root of a lot of problems
people in the antifa movement have with them - though there are other
issues, of course)
As regards the "general case" (though I am not yet aware of other such
cases) one of the features of the
"distributed collaborative model" that FLOSS work-practices revolve
around, is that it does not require
face to face encounters or indeed, necesarily, any exchange or leaking
of personal information which could
be of intelligence value to the enemy. However, most people in the FLOSS
movement (at least IMO) do not
have the necessary experience or habits of thought (a.k.a security
consciousness) antifa activists evolve over years of
operating and living in the same urban space as their mortal enemies,
not to let such information leak out in
the course of normal inter-project communication. If you're asking me
what all the answers are, I don't have them.
I suggest the only way to find them is collaboratively, in the same way
"we" produce other solutions. My intention
is to inform not too dictate - I am a Libertarian Communist, after all...
Personally I would not want to work on a free software project with a
Nazi, and if I were in their shoes I'd try to have him ejected. But
that's on the personal level, and on their personal level apparently
they aren't too bothered by it - or not bothered enough to exclude him,
anyway.
Well I'm not hugely happy with having a lot to do with Debian with him
in it at the moment, either. Especially seeing
as, perhaps by pure coincidence, Mr. Walther's discovery of my existence
was shortly followed by an spate of (failed)
Trojan attacks on my net-connected box which coincidentally disappeared
as soon as I mentioned it to the Debian
members I was then in contact with with a (not so innocent) query as to
how I would identify the boxes they were
originating from (the usual anonymous East European suspects of course).
I mean, "Back Orifice"? What am I, a moron?
I was insulted by the piss-poor level of these attacks (and re-assurred
that Walther is obviously not as impressive a
hacker as he clearly thinks he is - unless it was some cunning
double-bluff, but somehow I doubt it).
OTOH, considering my chosen contribution to Debian is in the
translation/documentation (lets face it, the documentation
in this movement leaves a lot to be desired...) department (I am
bi-lingual english/french with smatterings of spanish, italian
& german but none of the latter are of a standard to be any use in the
translation dept.) I can hardly not continue with that
just because Debian are happy letting a nazi manage some of their
modules....
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