Celebrity advice (was: Advice to a Junior in High School?)

Tim Churches tchur at optushome.com.au
Tue Aug 26 05:44:00 EDT 2003


Cameron Laird wrote:
> Sent: Tuesday, 26 August 2003 7:03 PM
> To: python-list at python.org
> Subject: Celebrity advice (was: Advice to a Junior in High School?)
> 
> In article <hgflkvsjpcfj1l0m2affhn74g61mhf6qr6 at 4ax.com>,
> Afanasiy  <abelikov72 at hotmail.com> wrote:
> >I would also recommend not giving much weight to anything from ESR.
>
> What's going on *there*?  Eric makes plenty of mistakes,
> and he's apparently stubborn and biased in many cases; on
> the other hand, while I disagree with him profoundly on
> some technical choices, and I've been told of all sorts
> of personal failings he exhibits, in my experience he's
> always been willing to correct errors when presented with 
> evidence.

Except when it comes to guns - despite all the evidence that
the ready availability of firearms to the general population 
Results in huge numbers of avoidable homicides, suicides, injuries,
incarceration and general mayhem, ESR actively promotes a 
puerile pro-gun libertarianism AND links that view to the open
Source culture. The aphorism which appears at the top left corner 
of his blog (see http://armedndangerous.blogspot.com/) is:
"Sex, software, politics, and firearms. Life's simple pleasures..."
I'd suggest that the last of those pastimes makes him a less 
than ideal speaker for a junior high school (and I didn't even 
mention Columbine...) - the first three are of course perfectly 
legitimate topics for such a speaker.

> I ask in part because, as near as I can tell, you were the 
> first to mention him in this thread.  It appears that you 
> regard his output as particularly hazardous.

See the first few paragraphs of 
http://www.catb.org/~esr/guns/gun-ethics.html

Tim C







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