> When I use proprietary software I'm not shackled to it.

Yes you are, since they often have vendor lock-in with proprietary formats. Sure, those formats are eventually reverse engineered by free software developers, but why not just cut out the middle man and use free software in the first place? .doc and .docx were proprietary formats that were reverse engineered so that you can use LibreOffice to open them (even though you still can't do stuff like fill in .docx forms using LibreOffice). How do you not see that as "being shackled"? Active Directory was a huge vendor lock-in for Microsoft until Samba came along, and Microsoft would every release make their proprietary protocol different so that Samba wouldn't work. How is that not being shackled?

> > The ethics questions become important when you consider the fact that most proprietary software developers do mistreat their users and the users are powerless to do anything about it

> This is a ludicrous statement, unless you take the FSF's view that any distribution of any non-free software is in itself mistreating users. I'd ask for some kind of evidence for the claim that most software developers mistreat their users, but I know there exists no such evidence.

Considering how many universal backdoors have been found in countless proprietary software systems, I'm surprised that you can't remember a single example. Cisco has universal backdoors. Windows has universal backdoors. NetGear had some too IIRC. There are far too many to mention.

For example: every single WiFi router that is owned by your ISP that supports WPS has a "feature" that allows the cable company to dump the entire configuration remotely (this is how the Reaver attack against WPS access points works). If that isn't a backdoor, I don't know what is. And you can't change the PIN on most of these boxes because they are proprietary and there's no option added to the web UI.

Not to mention that very many pieces of proprietary software send analytics to the software developers (which is usually hard if not impossible to disable).

Mobile phones have secondary CPUs that allow the phones to listen in on conversations and many other nefarious mis-features.

I'm not sure if you're trolling that you haven't considered ANY of the above "features" as being examples of software developers mistreating their users.

> The restaurant/recipe example is a good one because health codes are important. Most people think it's important to have some rules and regulations in place to protect the consumer. But most people also think these have to be kept at a minimum, because overly strict rules and regulations take away people's freedom, in a real way. Any problems you think exist regarding software can be fixed in a much more judicious manner than a blunt and heavy-handed "MAKE IT ALL FREE!" declaration.

I don't understand why you're talking about regulation. Without free software, you have no way of verifying that the software is actually what the developers say it is. Why is regulation necessary if companies could just release their code (under the 4 freedoms) to anybody who they give their software to?

> They want to restrict freedom. They want to restrict my freedom to sell (or even give away!) closed-source software. They want to restrict my freedom to purchase (or even receive for free!) closed-source software.

In the same (although more extreme) vein, the US constitution "restricts your freedom to become a slave". You are misusing the word freedom. It has a very strict definition. And I think the FSF wants to replace proprietary software, not make it illegal. If nobody has to use proprietary software, then the companies that produce will either have to liberate it or die on their own.