If this is even remotely true I hope he suffers enormous consequences including being persecuted.
How are people still getting away with this kind of abuse? How?
It's quite simple, really.
You know that phenomenon you see here on HN with big names like Steve Jobs or RMS, or Elon Musk? The phenomenon where people give them a pass for being disgusting, abusive assholes because "he's a genius/luminary/visionary" or because "his contributions to $thing are so great"?
It's the same phenomenon with people like Jon Pretty.
The phenomenon behind why these people get a pass is the same, even if their behavior is different.
None of the projects he developed along the years has had any momentum (save for one, called "magnolia", which has a modest userbase).
He was giving more talks than anyone else in the community, solely based on vague ideas he couldn't even make happen. He was always bluffing somehow, presenting himself as some kind of grand architect pursuing grand ideas, while his effective impact was close to zero.
I think he was tolerated just because he's been around since basically the language was created, and thus was friend with many people, and could tell stories about the early days of Scala.
With him (hopefully) going away, this will have no impact at all on the development of Scala or related projects, apart from saving slots at upcoming Scala conferences.
So it's definitely not the same phenomenon as RMS or Elon.
>None of the projects he developed along the years has had any momentum (save for one, called "magnolia", which has a modest userbase).
>He was giving more talks than anyone else in the community, solely based on vague ideas he couldn't even make happen. He was always bluffing somehow, presenting himself as some kind of grand architect pursuing grand ideas, while his effective impact was close to zero.
>I think he was tolerated just because he's been around since basically the language was created, and thus was friend with many people, and could tell stories about the early days of Scala.
Change just a handful of words and this exactly describes Stallman. I think my description is more apt than you might think.
I guarantee you that someone will post in this thread, if they haven't already, that she should know better than to get an airbnb with a man she doesn't know well. No, this isn't her fault. The dude should not have abused her.
You may be right, but you also have to agree that some people will pause before judging definite rape for described situation where girl accepts invitation to sleep in the same airbnb, without anybody else, with single guy, bringing bottle of wine, not mentioning she did not give consent, feeling bad afterwards. From that description it's really difficult to pass rape judgement - maybe it was, maybe not, what we know is that it was creepy at least for her.
None of those things even remotely imply consent for a sexual advance. Those are all things that should be fine for anyone of any gender to do together without there being fear of a sexual assault.
Anyone who looks at that list and thinks that it's ok to have unwanted sexual intercourse because they happened to have a bottle of wine in an AirBNB I'm not sure I want to associate with.
Insisting doesn't mean doing it, does it?
It's unfortunately ambiguous.
And furthermore, "not saying no" is not the bar for consent. An enthusiastic, unambiguous yes is the bar for consent. Not giving consent is the default, assumed position until that yes arrives.
As an thought experiment try to think that your husband/wife does those things with somebody (accepts invitation to sleep in the same airbnb, without anybody else, with single opposite sex, bringing bottle of wine) - would you be worried? And if yes, why? Is it not even remotely possible that somebody would feel weird about their partner doing it?
It says "there was another time that he insisted ..." which unfortunatelly forms ambiguous sentence, it's not clear if it happened or he just insisted and that's it.
Later paragraph reads "I maintained friendship with him for a few months after May, because I was convinced that it was all consensual ...".
I'm not a lawyer but the case of "being convinced of consent" at one time and after few months changing mind about the situation and realising it was not a consent makes an interesting case.
Read the comments in this thread six hours from now and you'll understand.
On the one hand I want people to be able to to speak their minds but on the other hand this guy might be a sexual predator at best and a serial rapist at worst. and he is getting away with it!
I for one am glad there is someone to stand up for him - it makes it very easy to tell who wants to cherrypick and debate semantics due to their own biases.