From the Open-Letter:
This is reason enough to not want to have someone else leading a group.
Public figures representing a movement should be able to interact diplomatically with people outside the movement without having them misunderstand or misrepresent the position of the movement.
Maybe, if it is true. But it's the part of the open letter that I disagree more with. I haven't worked much with RMS, almost nothing, and I've heard from people that have worked with him that he is excentrical (more or less acceptably so depending on who you speak to).
But my impression is that he's always been his own way and even joking about himself, not taking his own quirks too seriously. The point is not that he's been a great salesman or something or makes terrific first impressions. He's more of a thinker and can explain
his focus points very clearly. But that was true for decades, and was never such a problem, but a guarantee that the FSF would stay focused. I'm more worried for how the egocentrism and information overload of social networks has become such a habit that cancellation
attacks can be shooted at anyone without any concrete well grounded accusation that anyone could ever use before justice. In the end if you insist that all public figures are perfect diplomats, you will get organizations woking much harmonically because they'll never change anything or think outside the box. They only need to worry about budgets and contracts, and marketign campaigns and it's all easy peasy, but also useless.
It's not that the culture has changed and the thought crimes that were accepted before are unacceptable now, because I don't really think his thoughts even before were really so against the current values. And I don't have to agree with all he says, of course. For me it's more that today it is only possible to express oneself in much more conforming ways than before. It's like today the minimum appearance can rock the boat, because noone takes the time to look beyond appearances. So now people don't want experts in some idea or field, but politically correct people that react as socially accepted in absolutely everything, be it public or private, on topic or off topic, and never say anything unpopular even if they think and act abhorrently when unseen. That's more of a problem than anything RMS can do or say.
RMS did many good things for free software but maybe there are people more qualified than he is to be the public figure of free software.
Well I almost agree but see it from the other side. RMS has already age for retiring and I hesitate to encourage him to continue supporting a merciless mob that won't listen to anything and demands eternal poses about everything. In 2019, I thought RMS had done his share and of course that cancellation was no correct farewell, but maybe some rest would do him good. If I ever did a portion of what he had done for free software maybe I could dare ask him to continue, but since I won't be able, I should know when to let him go with thanks. But if he has tried, and wants to be back, I'm against any hysterical cancellation again. We still need his principles and ideals. But above all we need the debate to return to ideas and not figures. Ethics is not youtube. We need thinkers, not influencers. And arms (body part, not weapon), not pointing fingers.