Free Software and Love of Nature
Free Software (free as in libre, freedom) sometimes gets ridiculed by making personal attacks on the 'spiritual leader' (RMS), who fancies parrots as pets (not for him; he travels too much) and who compared smelling flowers to love-making (metaphors are shamelessly taken out of context by those with ill intentions; they don't seem to be bothered by "Lolita Express" Bill, instead they deflect).
Pets:I like cats if they are friendly, but they are not good for me; I am somewhat allergic to them. This allergy makes my face itch and my eyes water. So the bed, and the room I will usually be staying in, need to be clean of cat hair. However, it is no problem if there is a cat elsewhere in the house--I might even enjoy it if the cat is friendly.
Dogs that bark angrily and/or jump up on me frighten me, unless they are small and cannot reach much above my knees. But if they only bark or jump when we enter the house, I can cope, as long as you hold the dog away from me at that time. Aside from that issue, I'm ok with dogs.
If you can find a host for me that has a friendly parrot, I will be very very glad. If you can find someone who has a friendly parrot I can visit with, that will be nice too.
DON'T buy a parrot figuring that it will be a fun surprise for me. To acquire a parrot is a major decision: it is likely to outlive you. If you don't know how to treat the parrot, it could be emotionally scarred and spend many decades feeling frightened and unhappy. If you buy a captured wild parrot, you will promote a cruel and devastating practice, and the parrot will be emotionally scarred before you get it. Meeting that sad animal is not an agreeable surprise.
Looking at some of the people at the FSF right now, quite a few of them are vegans or vegetarians, as we noted some days and weeks ago in this site. We explained that it relates to a sense of ethics or morality, for people who reject proprietary software tend to have strong, uncompromisable principles. They'd uncompromisingly turn down anything with meat (or even egg or milk in the case of vegans), just like many geeks reject every invitation to things that are proprietary, even if the proprietary stuff runs remotely (at the server side).
RMS explained why it's OK to use an ATM with proprietary software in it (to withdraw cash) and as part of his activism for payment with cash he needs to explain why paying for things like flights without cash is acceptable (in short, explaining that flights cannot be boarded/embarked upon without one's identity anyway).
When it comes to the Open Data, Open Access and other "open" movements (typically it boils down to sharing, but not of computer code) morality is at the core and people who strive to reduce waste (by increasing reuse) typically speak about global warming, biodiversity, reducing pollution and so on.
It's not a coincidence that many Free software activists are also lovers of nature. They love animals.
Some hours ago I enjoyed feeding birds at the park. Some of them trust me enough to sit on my hand, even when there's no food there. Some other birds even fought other birds for a place on my palm/forearm. What RMS said about bird and flowers isn't as obscene as corporate media wants people to believe. RMS loves nature. There's nothing wrong with that. β