Bonum Certa Men Certa

Alexandre Oliva's Message About Cancel Culture at the FSF

Original blog post by the FSF's interim co-president

Alexandre Oliva



Being cancelled is no fun. In my case, it was for standing for a friend who got canceled for defending someone else from an accusation that was later proven false.



Occasionally, however, an opportunity to make fun of such a sad and frustrating situation arises, and then trolling the oppressors becomes irresistible.



When my friend got canceled and asked me to take his place in our organization, I and my colleagues there got a copy of Orwell's 1984 from an anonymous donor (thanks!, mine was falling apart).



The organization has just announced the schedule for a conference it organizes. I submitted a speech proposal, but I didn't even get a response. I'm told by people in the know that my speech was selected, but that there was concern I might speak in favor of the canceled person instead of the proposed topic, a freedom-compatible revamp of the portable telescreens nearly everyone else carries in their pockets or purses, so I got preemptively canceled as well. So much for an organization that fights for freedoms and human rights.



Anyway, when announcing on social media the schedule in which I was disappeared, the organization published a picture of last year's conference, at a keynote that took place on 2019-03-25. There was I, very big guy at the front plane, sitting on the second row in a very discrete, barely noticeable (not) chromakey-green T-shirt I got from the Tor Project (thanks!), like a big green canvas in the audience just waiting to be replaced in the picture.



I couldn't help the thought that this was indeed what'd happened to me in the conference schedule, and so the orders to Winston Smith's job at Minitrue, in Orwell's book's NewSpeak, came to mind.



So I posted a response in NewSpeak:



lptimes 25.3.19 misprint 2nd row tuxfree malchromakey duckspeakful unperson rectify



In the language currently spoken in Oceania and elsewhere, that translates to:



A misprint in the Mar 25, 2019 issue of lptimes shows a canceled person of unorthodox opinions on the second row, not wearing a tux, poorly and incompletely edited into a chromakey background color. Undo the poor attempt to add to the picture a person who could not possibly have been there, since canceled people never existed, reprint the issue with the restored original version of the picture, and throw the remaining copy of the picture into the memory hole.



If you were hopeful that "tuxfree" could mean something else, allow me to remind you that Linux-libre's "Free as in Freedo" slogan does not make sense in NewSpeak: in the process of eliminating the possibility of subversive thoughts, NewSpeak stripped from the word "Free" the meaning of political freedom, leaving only that of of absence or lack of something. A Freedom-free language for a Freedom-free society.



See you where there is no darkness. Or not. If you get this, you are the brotherhood (or is it the resistance?) (see slides 9 and 10). Otherwise, maybe Big Brother is ''patching'' you.



So blong...






Copyright 2007-2020 Alexandre Oliva

Permission is granted to make and distribute verbatim copies of this entire document worldwide without royalty, provided the copyright notice, the document's official URL, and this permission notice are preserved.

The following licensing terms also apply to all documents and postings in this blog that don't contain a copyright notice of their own, or that contain a notice equivalent to the one above, and whose copyright can be reasonably assumed to be held by Alexandre Oliva.

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons License BY-SA (Attribution ShareAlike) 3.0 Unported. To see a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/ or send a letter to Creative Commons, 444 Castro Street, Suite 900, Mountain View, California, 94041, USA.

Recent Techrights' Posts

Like GAFAM, US Telecom Industry Has Severe Debt Problem
Maybe their real problem is true profitability
Latest Example of False Marketing by Anthropic
Like Scam Altman, they're better at buying publicity (paying for hype) than they are at delivering something of genuine value [...] That has the full make-up of fake news and a publicity stunt
IBM: From RAs to "Workforce Re-balancing" (New Names for Mass Layoffs)
Well, "workforce re-balancing" means "RAs", which is a misleading acronym IBM has devised to soften if not hide mass layoffs.
Microsoft's Grip Has Slipped, Market Share Steadily Declining
This is why Microsoft is having financial issue
SLAPP Censorship - Part 60 Out of 200: Talking About Corruption at Microsoft and Arrest for Strangulation is "Malice"
At the moment Brett Wilson LLP has no new clients
The Corrupt Lecture the Non-Corrupt - Part VIII - "Red Line" When the European Patent Office (EPO) President Sleeps With Sister of "Cocaine Communication Manager" (Whom He Unconditionally Protects)
If only management took its own words (idealistic pontification) seriously
 
Anthropic and Claude Are National Security Risks Not Because of Politics But False Marketing and Vandalism, Plagiarism Sold as Innovation
The slop hype is causing severe damage
Gemini Links 28/04/2026: Misfin, ELPiS, and Developing Another Gemini Client
Links for the day
US Government Sites See More Traffic From Apple Devices Than Microsoft Windows PCs
Keep this in mind when Microsoft talks about mass layoffs while calling these "buyouts"
Layoffs Versus Buyouts
Microsoft has mass layoffs and those target the most experienced people in one of the best-paid locations
Aaron Hillel Swartz Would Have Turned 40 This Year
Aaron Swartz killed himself in 2013
The Trumps Are Making Jimmy Kimmel More Famous and Popular
Comedy has long been "controversial", but trying to get people sacked for the 'wrong' joke results in having no comedians or only pseudo-comedians who are the dictator's jester/joker
Links 28/04/2026: Microsoft's GitHub Upselling After Two Leaders Jumped Ship (Losses Pile Up), "Inflation Jumps," and More
Links for the day
IBM Laying Off Thousands of Workers Again, Based on Q1 Earnings Call
under the guise of "workforce rebalancing" we are again seeing that IBM plans to pay people (severance) to leave
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Monday, April 27, 2026
IRC logs for Monday, April 27, 2026
Gemini Links 28/04/2026: Good Sunrise Viewing and Self-hosting from Home
Links for the day[1;5C
Microsoft Insiders: If You Don't Take the Lousy Severance-Like Offer, They'll PIP You Out (Microsoft Signals to People Over 40 That They'd Better Vacate the Place)
Microsoft targets its most experienced (read: expensive) workers
"AI" 16 Times in One 'Article'. The Register MS Got Paid to Post This Spammy, Promotional Piece of Slop.
Pay closer attention to who pays and who gets paid
Links 27/04/2026: Chernobyl Disaster at 40, "Heartbreaking" Decline of Australia
Links for the day
Gemini Links 27/04/2026: Gopher Catchup, MNT Reform, and Injuries
Links for the day
Red Hat Circling Down the Slop Drain
IBM, governed by slop fanatics, is going to do a lot of damage
Slop is an Addiction, Its Users Find It Addictive
please do not tolerate people who slop
The Corrupt Lecture the Non-Corrupt - Part VII - Secrecy at the EPO (Regarding Cocaine and Nepotism) Has Undermined Trust in Management
If Europe's second-largest institution is run by the "Alicante Mafia", does this mean that other key European institutions are "Mafia"?
SLAPP Censorship - Part 59 Out of 200: Mentioning the Fact Alex Graveley Arrested and Charged for Strangulation in Texas is "Reckless" and "Malicious", According to His 'Hired Guns' in London
it was framed as "malicious"
Links 27/04/2026: Strikes, Corruption in Spain (Spanish PM Sanchez' Wife), and YouTuber Faces Jail Time
Links for the day
Gemini Links 27/04/2026: Gopher Catch-up, Year of Contentment, and Path to Freedom
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Sunday, April 26, 2026
IRC logs for Sunday, April 26, 2026
Journalistic Malpractice: Helping Microsoft Paint 'Voluntary' Layoffs (Before PIPs) as "Buyouts"
What does this tell us about today's media?
The Man IBMers Regard or Already See as Likely Successor of Krishna (or Next CEO of IBM) is a Slop Fanatic
How dangerously misguided
The Corrupt Lecture the Non-Corrupt - Part VI - Management of the European Patent Office (EPO) Covered Up Cocaine Use, Even Colleagues Not Informed
the self-described "fu--ing president"
SLAPP Censorship - Part 58 Out of 200: 5RB and Brett Wilson LLP Helped Garrett and Graveley Make Equivalent of GAFAM NDAs Superficially 'Enforceable' in the UK, Using Threats
laziness results in many hours and high lawyers' fees
Who Controls Fedora? IBM and GAFAM.
Don't for a moment believe that IBM understands GNU/Linux. We are quite certain nobody in IBM's Board of Directors uses it.
State of Slop About GNU/Linux
As the incentive to publish is reduced (competing with slop is no fun), the effort/money invested in stories goes down
Links 26/04/2026: Korean Inflation, GLP-1 Drugs Linked to Cognitive Impairment, Lithuania's Public Broadcaster LRT Besieged
Links for the day
Hopefully Smooth Sailing in OS Upgrade
There are some contingencies at hand
Links 25/04/2026: "Horrible Economics of AI Are Starting to Come Crashing Down", More Restrictions Placed on Social Control Media
Links for the day
Getting Aggressive Suggestive of Loss - Part IV - Shutting Down My Existence
Would anyone out there tolerate such messages sent from burner accounts?
Gemini Links 26/04/2026: Gemini Movie Database (or GeminiMDB) and Star Trek III
Links for the day
Weeks Before Linux Removed Over 100,000 Lines of Code Due to Slop 'Bug Reports' Microsoft Paid 'Linux' Foundation to Advance Slop in the Name of 'Security'
What can possible go wrong? Both for security and for stability.
Tracking Ages of People
To stay "safe" tell us your age
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Saturday, April 25, 2026
IRC logs for Saturday, April 25, 2026