Some believe that RMS did nothing wrong. If he hurt people, that's worth addressing, because it is people who make up the free software communities. A function of leadership is to be accountable, not perfect, and in that vein it is on RMS to respond as he did.

I always cringe when I see people engage in apology grading. I may be in the minority here but I rarely find it appropriate for leaders in any sense to apologize. It's your job to lead, whether that be in thought, action, or both and I expect that over the course of thousands of decisions for an increasingly ballooning pool of people to represent that you will make mistakes, even large ones, along the way. What I do expect is that leaders are accountable. That doesn't mean to say that leaders should be bound to write out formal apologies to people they hurt, because for every decision on an important issue you will end up hurting someone.

For instance, the ideals of free software (as defined by RMS and others) from time to time will likely offend and hurt others. This was relevant when people were trying to modify free software licenses to prevent their software from being used by certain government agencies or authoritarian governments while attempting to continue to benefit from the term "free software". Unfortunately, as pointed out, that very act violated the principles of free software, which exist in their purity to ensure access to even the most oppressed societies across the world. I am sure the people who championed the purity of this access were viewed as hurtful and oppressive by some in the moment. I do expect that these folks will stand up in the face of fierce opposition and will confidently answer their intent and mitigating circumstances and take note for improvements into the future; the same way we would RCA good software.

I have a hard time understanding why RMS spends so much time openly espousing his thoughts on a wide range of subjects. I do this in my personal time with friends but I constrain that to people I know because they understand me and my principles. On the other hand, saying that he isn't allowed to comment on other things or classifying that activity as "distracting" is interesting. I feel the same way when I find out developers I like and follow have edgy opinions about race and gender, but I also draw a line of distinction that acknowledges that their experiences in life may just be different from mine, even if they occasionally offend me, and that's okay. The world does take all types, and things I've taken offense to have been done in good faith a good amount of the time.

The last notion I'll touch on is that we often expect that leaders will be fully invested in advancing our goals and the traits of the organization. We champion leaders who can take an organization that has lost its way and turn it into something, but do we make the same expectations of ourselves to leaders. Is there a point where we start to invest ourselves into organically growing RMS in certain facets? Free software has grown and evolved, but it sounds like RMS hasn't - should we really cast him aside and decide all of his investment in us is now worthless that he requires investment? That's not to say that people haven't tried to course correct him, because they likely have, but sometimes in order to grow people need things to get worse in order to get better. That's where our investment, as a community, in him starts. That could mean that he seeks therapy, it could mean he gets a publicist, it could mean a wide variety of things, but I'm favorable to treating leaders like the humans that they are.