Oligarchs and States Always Attempted to Obstruct Efforts to Expose Their Corruption
When you are high/drunk on power (or just ego), it's as natural as breathing to you to try to curtail, silence, sometimes kill critics. That's just how it has always been. The people who do this justify this to themselves; being narcissists, they're convinced that every critics of theirs is the real problem (for they themselves are, of course, always righteous and well-meaning, they're benevolent dictators or 'generous' "philanthropists" whom the peasantry doesn't revere enough). You know you've truly pissed off the right people when they resort to shameful, desperate tactics which at the end result in their own expulsion/toppling, as we saw in Egypt 15 years ago. Egyptians learned the moral of this story: fight on.
In the case of Free software, its pioneer is scheduled to deliver his first public talk in a US college (university) since 2018. We commend the administrator who consistently and adamantly defend the freedom of speech, recognising what happens when it goes away (the rich people take over everything). █
Image source: Official photograph of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, taken in 1985.
