commit: 556ae460efed6e18914ccedcec1751bdc5d15f68
parent 163453a37f6262e4abb009de2caa86dec843bb9e
Author: Drew DeVault <sir@cmpwn.com>
Date: Sun, 26 Nov 2023 10:23:10 +0100
RMS on sex
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+---
+title: Richard Stallman's political discourse on sex
+date: 2023-11-25
+---
+
+Richard Stallman, the founder of the Free Software Foundation, has been subject
+to numerous allegations of misconduct. He stepped down in 2019, and following
+his re-instatement in 2021, a famous [open letter][0] was published in which
+numerous organizations and individuals from throughout the Free Software
+ecosystem called for his removal from the Free Software Foundation. The letter
+had no effect; Stallman remains a voting member of the FSF's [board of
+directors][1] to this day and continues to receive numerous [speaking
+engagements][2].
+
+*Content warning: This article discusses sexual abuse, sexual assault, sexual
+harassment, and all of the above with respect to minors, as well as the systemic
+normalization of abuse, and directly quotes statements which participate in the
+normalization of abuse.*
+
+[0]: https://rms-open-letter.github.io/
+[1]: https://www.fsf.org/about/staff-and-board
+[2]: https://stallman.org/talks.html
+
+This article presents an analysis of Stallman's political discourse on sex with
+the aim of establishing the patterns that cause the sort of discomfort that led
+to Stallman's public condemnation. In particular, we will address how Stallman
+speaks about sexual assault, harassment, consent, and minors in his discourse.
+
+I think that it is important to acknowledge this behavior not as a series of
+isolated incidents, nor a conflict with Stallman's "[personal style][style]",
+but a pattern of behavior from which a political narrative forms, and draws
+attention to the fact that the meager retractions, excuses, and non-apologies
+from both Stallman and the Free Software Foundation as a whole fail to account
+for that pattern in a meaningful way.
+
+[style]: https://www.fsf.org/news/statement-of-fsf-board-on-election-of-richard-stallman
+
+The failure of the Free Software community to account for Richard Stallman's
+behavior has a chilling effect. The norms set by our leadership influence the
+norms of our broader community, and many members of the Free Software community
+look to Stallman as a ideological and political leader. The norms Stallman
+endorses are harmful and deeply confronting and alienating to many people, in
+particular women and children. Should these norms be adopted by our movement, we
+risk creating a community which enables the exploitation of vulnerable people.
+
+Let's begin to address this by considering Stallman's retraction of his comments
+in support of pedophilia. The following comment from Stallman in 2013 drew harsh
+criticism:
+
+> There is little evidence to justify the widespread assumption that willing
+> participation in pedophilia hurts children.
+
+<small>— <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20210325014249/https://stallman.org/archives/2012-nov-feb.html#04_January_2013_(Pedophilia)">stallman.org, 04 January 2013 "Pedophilia"</a></small>
+
+Following much of the criticism directed at Stallman, he had a number of
+"personal conversations" which reframed his views. Of the many comments Stallman
+has made which drew ire, this is one of the few for which a correction was made,
+in September 2019:
+
+> Many years ago I posted that I could not see anything wrong about sex between
+> an adult and a child, if the child accepted it.
+>
+> Through personal conversations in recent years, I've learned to understand how
+> sex with a child can harm per psychologically. This changed my mind about the
+> matter: I think adults should not do that. I am grateful for the conversations
+> that enabled me to understand why.
+
+<small>— <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20210325015259/https://stallman.org/archives/2019-jul-oct.html#14_September_2019_(Sex_between_an_adult_and_a_child_is_wrong)">stallman.org, 14 September 2019 "Sex between an adult and a child is wrong"</a></small>
+
+This statement from Stallman has been accepted by his defenders as evidence of
+his capitulation on pedophilia. I argue that this statement is misleading due to
+the particular way Stallman uses the word "child". When Stallman uses this word,
+he does so with a very specific meaning, which he explains on his website:
+
+> Children: Humans up to age 12 or 13 are children. After that, they become
+> adolescents or teenagers. Let's resist the practice of infantilizing
+> teenagers, by not calling them "children".
+
+<small>— <a href="https://www.stallman.org/antiglossary.html">stallman.org, "Anti-glossary"</a></small>
+
+It seems clear from this definition is that Stallman's comments are not a
+capitulation at all. His 2019 retraction, when interpreted using his definition
+of "children", does not contradict most of Stallman's past statements regarding
+sex and minors, including his widely criticized defenses of many people accused
+of sexual impropriety with minors.
+
+Stallman's most recent direct response to his criticism underscores this:
+
+> It was right for me to talk about the injustice to Minsky, but it was
+> tone-deaf that I didn't acknowledge as context the injustice that Epstein did
+> to women or the pain that caused.
+
+<small>— <a href="https://www.fsf.org/news/rms-addresses-the-free-software-communit">fsf.org, April 12, 2021, "RMS addresses the free software community"</a></small>
+
+Stallman qualifies his apology by explicitly re-affirming his defense of Marvin
+Minsky, which is addressed in detail later in this piece. Stallman's
+doubling-down here is consistent with the supposition that Stallman maintains
+the view that minors can have sexual relationships with adults of any age,
+provided that they aren't "children" -- in other words, provided they're at
+least 13 or 14 years old.
+
+Stallman cares deeply about language and its usage. His strange and deliberate
+usage of the word "children" is also found many times throughout his political
+notes over the years. For example:
+
+> It sounds horrible: "UN peacekeepers accused of child rape in South Sudan."
+> But the article makes it pretty clear that the "children" involved were not
+> children. They were teenagers.
+
+<small>— <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20180509120046/https://stallman.org/archives/2018-mar-jun.html#30_April_2018_(UN_peacekeepers_in_South_Sudan)">stallman.org, 30 April 2018 "UN peacekeepers in South Sudan"</a></small>
+
+Here Stallman again explicitly distinguishes "teenagers" from children, drawing
+this distinction especially in the context of sexual relationships between
+adults and minors. Stallman repeats this pattern many times over the years -- we
+see it again in Stallman's widely criticized defense of Cody Wilson:
+
+> Cody Wilson has been charged with hiring a "child" sex worker. Her age has
+> not been announced, but I think she must surely be a teenager, not a child.
+> Calling teenagers "children" in this context is a way of smearing people with
+> normal sexual proclivities as "perverts".
+
+<small>— <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20180924231708/https://stallman.org/archives/2018-jul-oct.html#23_September_2018_(Cody_Wilson)">stallman.org, 23 September 2018 "Cody Wilson"</a></small>
+
+And once more when defending Roy Moore:
+
+> Senate candidate Roy Moore tried to start dating/sexual relationships with
+> teenagers some decades ago.
+>
+> He tried to lead Ms Corfman step by step into sex, but he always respected
+> "no" from her and his other dates. Thus, Moore does not deserve the
+> exaggerated condemnation that he is receiving for this. As an example of
+> exaggeration: one mailing referred to these teenagers as "children", even the
+> one that was 18 years old. Many teenagers are minors, but none of them are
+> children.
+>
+> The condemnation is surely sparked by the political motive of wanting to
+> defeat Moore in the coming election, but it draws fuel from ageism and the
+> fashion for overprotectiveness of "children".
+
+<small>— <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20180104112431/https://www.stallman.org/archives/2017-nov-feb.html#27_November_2017_(Roy_Moore's_relationships)">stallman.org, 27 November 2017 "Roy Moore's relationships"</a></small>
+
+Ms. Corfman was 14 at the time Roy Moore is accused of initiating sexual contact
+with her; Moore was 32 at the time. Here we see an example of him re-iterating
+his definition of "children", a distinction he draws especially to suggest that
+an adult having sex with a minor is socially acceptable.
+
+Note that Stallman refers to Ms. Corfman as Moore's "date". Stallman's use of
+this word is important: here he normalizes the possibility that a minor and an
+adult could engage in a healthy dating relationship. In this statement, Stallman
+cites an article which explains circumstances which do not resemble such a
+normalized dating experience: Moore isolated Corfman from her mother, drove her
+directly to his home, and initiated sexual contact there.
+
+Note also that the use of the phrase "step by step" in this quotation is more
+commonly referred to as "grooming" in the discourse on child sexual
+exploitation.
+
+Stallman reaches for similar reasoning in other political notes, such as the
+following:
+
+> A British woman is on trial for going to a park and inviting teenage boys to
+> have sex with her there. Her husband acted as a lookout in case someone else
+> passed by. One teenager allegedly visited her at her house repeatedly to have
+> sex with her.
+>
+> None of these acts would be wrong in any sense, provided they took precautions
+> against spreading infections. The idea that adolescents (of whatever sex) need
+> to be "protected" from sexual experience they wish to have is prudish
+> ignorantism, and making that experience a crime is perverse.
+
+<small>— <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20170612074722/http://stallman.org/archives/2017-mar-jun.html#26_May_2017_(Prudish_ignorantism)">stallman.org, 26 May 2017, "Prudish ignorantism"</a></small>
+
+The woman in question, aged 60, had sex with her husband, age 69, in a public
+space, and invited spectators as young as 11 to participate.
+
+Stallman has also sought to normalize adult attraction to minors, literally
+describing it as "normal" in September 2018:
+
+> Calling teenagers "children" encourages treating teenagers as children, a
+> harmful practice which retards their development into capable adults.
+>
+> In this case, the effect of that mislabeling is to smear Wilson. It is rare,
+> and considered perverse, for adults to be physically attracted to children.
+> However, it is normal for adults to be physically attracted to adolescents.
+> Since the claims about Wilson is the latter, it is wrong to present it as the
+> former.
+
+<small>— <a href="https://www.stallman.org/archives/2018-sep-dec.html#23_September_2018_(Cody_Wilson)">stallman.org, 23 September 2018, "Cody Wilson"</a></small>
+
+One month prior, Stallman made a statement which similarly normalized adult
+attraction to minors, and suggests that acting on this attraction should be
+acceptable to society, likening opposition to this view to homosexual conversion
+therapy:
+
+> This accords with the view that Stendhal reported in France in the 1800s,
+> that a woman's most beautiful years were from 16 to 20.
+>
+> Although this attitude on men's part is normal, the author still wants to
+> present it as wrong or perverted, and implicitly demands men somehow control
+> their attraction to direct it elsewhere. Which is as absurd, and as
+> potentially oppressive, as claiming that homosexuals should control their
+> attraction and direct it towards to the other sex. Will men be pressured to
+> undergo "age conversion therapy" intended to brainwash them to feel attracted
+> mainly to women of their own age?
+
+<small>— <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20180911075211/https://www.stallman.org/archives/2018-jul-oct.html#21_August_2018_(Age_and_attraction)">stallman.org, 21 August 2018, "Age and attraction"</a></small>
+
+A trend is thus clearly seen in Stallman's regular political notes, over several
+years, wherein Stallman re-iterates his position that "adolescents" or
+"teenagers" are distinct from "children" for the purpose of having sex with
+adults, and normalizes and defends adult attraction to minors and adults who
+perform sexual acts with minors. We see this distinction of the two groups,
+children and adolescents, outlined again on his "anti-glossary", which still
+published on his website today, albeit without the connotations of sex. His
+regular insistence on a definition of children which excludes adolescents
+serves such that his redaction of his controversial 2013 comment serves to
+redact none of the other widely-condemned comments he has made since.
+
+Stallman has often written political notes when people accused of sexual
+impropriety, particularly with minors, appear in the news, or appear among
+Stallman's social circle. Stallman's comments generally downplay the abuse and
+manipulate language in a manner which benefits perpetrators of abuse. We see
+this downplaying in another example from 2019:
+
+> Should we accept stretching the terms "sexual abuse" and "molestation" to
+> include looking without touching?
+>
+> I do not accept it.
+
+<small>— <a href="https://www.stallman.org/archives/2019-may-aug.html#11_June_2019_(Stretching_meaning_of_terms)">stallman.org, 11 June 2019 "Stretching meaning of terms"</a></small>
+
+Stallman is writing here in response to a news article outlining accusations of
+sexual misconduct directed at Ohio State athletics doctor Richard Strauss.
+Strauss was accused of groping at least 177 students between 1979 and 1997
+during routine physical exams, accusations corroborated by at least 50 members
+of the athletic department staff.
+
+In addition to Stallman's regular fixation of the use of the word "children"
+with respect to sex, this political note also draws our attention to the next
+linguistic fixation of Stallman I want to question: the use of phrases like
+"sexual abuse" and "sexual assault". The term "sexual assault" also appears in
+Stallman's "Anti-glossary":
+
+> Sexual assault: The term is applied to a broad range of actions, from rape on
+> one end, to the least physical contact on the other, as well as everything in
+> between. It acts as propaganda for treating them all the same. That would be
+> wrong.
+>
+> The term is further stretched to include sexual harassment, which does not
+> refer to a single act, but rather to a series of acts that amounts to a form
+> of gender bias. Gender bias is rightly prohibited in certain situations for
+> the sake of equal opportunity, but that is a different issue.
+>
+> I don't think that rape should be treated the same as a momentary touch.
+> People we accuse have a right to those distinctions, so I am careful not to
+> use the term "sexual assault" to categorize the actions of any person on any
+> specific occasion.
+
+<small>— <a href="https://www.stallman.org/antiglossary.html">stallman.org, "Anti-glossary"</a></small>
+
+Stallman often fixates on the term "sexual assault" throughout his political
+notes. He feels that the term fails to distinguish between "grave" and "minor"
+crimes, as he illustrated in 2021:
+
+> "Sexual assault" is so vague that it makes no sense as a charge. Because of
+> that term, we can't whether these journalists were accused of a grave crime
+> or a minor one. However, the charge of espionage shows this is political
+> persecution.
+
+<small>— <a href="https://stallman.org/archives/2021-jul-oct.html#21_July_2021_(Imprisonment_of_journalists)">stallman.org, 21 July 2021, "Imprisonment of journalists"</a></small>
+
+I would like to find out what kind of crimes Stallman feels the need to
+distinguish along this axis. His other political notes give us some hints,
+such as this one regarding Al Franken's sexual misconduct scandal:
+
+> If it is true that he persistently pressured her to kiss him, on stage and
+> off, if he stuck his tongue into her mouth despite her objections, that could
+> well be sexual harassment. He should have accepted no for an answer the first
+> time she said it. However, calling a kiss "sexual assault" is an exaggeration,
+> an attempt to equate it to much graver acts, that are crimes.
+>
+> The term "sexual assault" encourages that injustice, and I believe it has been
+> popularized specifically with that intention. That is why I reject that term.
+
+<small>— <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20190801201704/https://stallman.org/archives/2019-may-aug.html#30_July_2019_(Al_Franken)">stallman.org, 30 July 2019, "Al Franken"</a></small>
+
+Stallman also wrote in 2020 to question the use of the phrase again:
+
+> In the US, when thugs[^thugs] rape people they say are suspects, it is
+> rare to bring them to justice.
+>
+> I object to describing any one crime as "sexual assault" because that is vague
+> about the severity of the crime. This article often uses that term to refer to
+> many crimes that differ in severity but raise the same issue. That may be a
+> valid practice.
+
+<small>— <a href="https://stallman.org/notes/2020-jul-oct.html#12_August_2020_(When_thugs_rape_people_they_say_are_suspects)">stallman.org, 12 August 2020, "When thugs rape people they say are suspects"</a></small>
+
+[^thugs]: Stallman consistently refers to police officers as "thugs" in his
+ writing; see Stallman's [Glossary](https://stallman.org/glossary.html).
+
+In the article Stallman cites in this political note, various unwelcome sexual
+acts by the police are described, the least severe of which is probably
+molestation.
+
+More alarmingly, Stallman addresses his views on the term "sexual assault" in
+this 2017 note, affording for the possibility that a 35-year-old man could have
+had consensual sex with an 11-year-old girl.
+
+> Jelani Maraj (who I had never heard of) could be imprisoned for a long time
+> for "sexual assault". What does that concretely mean?
+>
+> Due to the vagueness of the term "sexual assault" together with the dishonest
+> law that labels sex with adolescents as "rape" even if they are willing, we
+> cannot tell from this article what sort of acts Maraj was found to have
+> committed. So we can't begin to judge whether those acts were wrong.
+>
+> I see at least three possibilities. Perhaps those acts really constituted
+> rape — it is a possibility. Or perhaps the two had sex willingly, but her
+> parents freaked out and demanded prosecution. Or, intermediate between those
+> two, perhaps he pressured her into having sex, or got her drunk.
+
+<small>— <a href="https://stallman.org/archives/2017-nov-feb.html#13_November_2017_(Jelani_Maraj)">stallman.org, 13 November 2017, "Jelani Maraj"</a></small>
+
+Another article by Stallman does not explicitly refer to sexual assault, but
+does engage in a bizarre defense of a journalist who was fired for masturbating
+during a video conference. In this article Stallman fixates on questions such as
+whether or not the genitals being in view of the webcam was intentional or not,
+and suggests that masturbating on a video call would be acceptable should the
+genitals remain unseen.
+
+> The New Yorker's unpublished note to staff was vague about its grounds for
+> firing Toobin. Indeed, it did not even acknowledge that he had been fired.
+> This is unfair, like convicting someone on unstated charges. Something didn't
+> meet its "standards of conduct", but it won't tell us what — we can only
+> guess. What are the possibilities? Intentionally engaging in video-call sex as
+> a side activity during a work meeting? If he had not made a mistake in keeping
+> that out of view of the coworkers, why would it make a difference what the
+> side activity was?
+
+<small>— <a href="https://www.stallman.org/articles/toobin.html">stallman.org, November 2020, "On the Firing of Jeffrey Toobin"</a></small>
+
+Finally, Stallman elaborated on his thoughts on the term most recently in
+October 2023. This note gives the clearest view of Stallman's preferred
+distinction between various sexual crimes:
+
+> I warned that the stretchable term "sexual assault", which extends from grave
+> crimes such as rape through significant crimes such as groping and down to no
+> clear lower bound, could be stretched to criminalize minor things, perhaps
+> even stealing a kiss. Now this has happened.
+>
+> What next? Will a pat on the arm or a hug be criminalized? There is no clear
+> limit to how far this can go, when a group builds up enough outrage to push
+> it.
+
+<small>— <a href="https://www.stallman.org/archives/2023-sep-dec.html#15_October_2023_(Sexual_assault_for_stealing_a_kiss)">stallman.org, 15 October 2023, "Sexual assault for stealing a kiss"</a></small>
+
+From Stallman's statements, we can refine his objection to the term "sexual
+assault", and sexual behaviors generally, to further suggest that the following
+beliefs are held by Stallman on the subject:
+
+- Groping and molestation are not sexual assault, but are crimes
+- Kissing someone without consent is not sexual assault, furthermore it is not wrong
+- Masturbating during a video conference is not wrong if you are not seen doing so
+- A 35-year-old man having sex with an 11-year-old girl does not constitute
+ rape, nor sexual assault, but is in fact conscionable
+
+The last of these may be covered under Stallman's 2019 retraction, even
+accounting for Stallman's unconventional use of the word "children".
+
+Stallman's fixation on the term "sexual assault" can be understood in his
+political notes as having the political aims of eroding the meaning of the
+phrase, questioning the boundaries of consent, downplaying the importance of
+agency in intimate interactions, appealing for the defense of people accused of
+sexual assault, and arguing for sexual relationships between minors and adults
+to be normalized. In one notable case, he has used this political angle to rise
+to the defense of his friends -- in Stallman's infamous email regarding Marvin
+Minsky, he writes the following:
+
+> The injustice [done to Minsky] is in the word “assaulting”. The term “sexual
+> assault” is so vague and slippery that it facilitates accusation inflation:
+> taking claims that someone did X and leading people to think of it as Y, which
+> is much worse than X.
+>
+> (...)
+>
+> The word “assaulting” presumes that he applied force or violence, in some
+> unspecified way, but the article itself says no such thing. Only that they had
+> sex.
+>
+> We can imagine many scenarios, but the most plausible scenario is that she
+> presented herself to him as entirely willing. Assuming she was being coerced
+> by Epstein, he would have had every reason to tell her to conceal that from
+> most of his associates.
+>
+> I’ve concluded from various examples of accusation inflation that it is
+> absolutely wrong to use the term “sexual assault” in an accusation.
+
+<small>— Excerpt from <a href="https://scribe.rip/medium.com/@selamie/remove-richard-stallman-fec6ec210794">Selam G's recount of Stallman's email</a> to MIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory mailing list, September 2019. Selam's quotation has been corroborated by other sources.
+Minsky is, in this context, accused of having had a sexual encounter with a
+minor facilitated by convicted child trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell. The original
+accusation does not state that this sexual encounter actually occurred; only
+that the minor in question was instructed to have sex with Minsky. Minsky would
+have been at least 75 years old at the time of the alleged incident; the minor
+was 16.
+</small>
+
+There is an important, but more subtle pattern in Stallman's statements that I
+want to draw your attention to here: Stallman appears to have little to no
+understanding of the role of power dynamics in sexual harassment, assault, and
+rape. Stallman appears to reject the supposition that these acts could occur
+without an element of outwardly apparent violent coercion.
+
+This is most obviously evidenced by his statements regarding the sexual abuse of
+minors; most people understand that minors cannot consent to sex even if they
+"appear willing", in particular because an adult in this situation is exploiting
+a difference in experience and maturity to manipulate the child into sexually
+satisfying them -- in other words, a power differential. Stallman seems to
+reject this understanding of consent in his various defenses of people accused
+of sexual impropriety with minors, and in cases where the pretense of consent
+cannot be easily established, he offers the perpetrator the benefit of the
+doubt.
+
+We can also find an example of Stallman disregarding power dynamics with respect
+to adults in the following political note from 2017:
+
+> A famous theater director had a habit of pestering women, asking them for sex.
+>
+> As far as I can tell from this article, he didn't try to force women into sex.
+>
+> When women persistently said no, he does not seem to have tried to punish them.
+>
+> The most he did was ask.
+>
+> He was a pest, but nothing worse than that.
+
+<small>— <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20180131020215/https://stallman.org/archives/2017-jul-oct.html#29_October_2017_(Pestering_women)">stallman.org, 29 October 2017, "Pestering women"</a></small>
+
+In this case we have an example of "quid pro quo", a kind of sexual harassment
+which weaponizes power dynamics for sexual gratification. This kind of sexual
+harassment is explicitly cited as illegal by Title VII of the US Civil Rights
+Act. A lack of competence in this respect displayed by Stallman, whose position
+in the Free Software Foundation board of directors requires that he act in a
+manner consistent with this law, is alarming.
+
+I have identified this blindness to power dynamics as a recurring theme in
+Stallman's comments on sexual abuse, be it with respect to sexual relationships
+between minors and adults, managers and subordinates, students and teachers, or
+public figures and their audience. I note for the reader that Stallman has held
+and currently holds several of these positions of power.
+
+In addition to his position as a voting member of the Free Software Foundation's
+Board of Directors, Stallman is still invited to speak at events and
+conferences. [Stallman's infamous rider][rider] prescribes a number of his
+requirements for attending an event; most of his conditions are relatively
+reasonable, though amusing. In this document, he states his preference for being
+accommodated in private, on a "spare couch", when he travels. At these events,
+in these private homes, he may be afforded many opportunities to privacy with
+vulnerable people, including minors that, in his view, can consent to having sex
+with adults.
+
+[rider]: https://github.com/ddol/rre-rms/blob/master/fulltext/20111018.txt
+
+In summary, Stallman has a well-documented and oft-professed set of political
+beliefs which reject the social and legal norms regarding consent. He is not
+simply quietly misled in these beliefs; rather he advocates for these values
+using his political platform. He has issued no meaningful retractions of these
+positions or apologies for harm caused, and has continued to pursue a similar
+agenda since his return to the FSF board of directors.
+
+This creates a toxic environment not only in the Free Software Foundation and in
+Stallman's direct purview, but in the broader Free Software movement. The free
+software movement is culturally poisoned by our support of Stallman as our
+ideological leader. The open letter calling for Stallman's removal received
+3,000 signatures; the counter-letter in support of Stallman received 6,876
+before it stopped accepting submissions.
+
+Richard Stallman founded the Free Software Foundation in 1985, and has performed
+innumerable works to the benefit of our community since then. We've taken
+Stallman's views on software freedom seriously, and they've led us to great
+achievements. It is to Stallman's credit that the Free Software community is
+larger than one man. However, one's political qualifications to speak about free
+software does not make one qualified to address matters of sex; in this respect
+Stallman's persistence presents as dangerous incompetence.
+
+When we consider his speech on sex as a discourse that has been crafted and
+rehearsed methodically over the years, he asks us to consider him seriously, and
+so we must. When we analyze the dangerous patterns in this discourse, we have to
+conclude that he is not fit for purpose in his leadership role, and we must
+acknowledge the shadow that our legitimization of his discourse casts on our
+community.
