[ A similar version of this blog post
was cross-posted
on Software Freedom Conservancy's blog. ]
In recent weeks, I've been involved with a complex internal discussion by
a major software freedom project about a desire to take a stance on social
justice issues other than software freedom. In the discussion, many
different people came forward with various issues that matter to them,
including vegetarianism, diversity, and speech censorship, wondering how that
software freedom project should handle other social justices causes that are
not software freedom. This week, (separate and fully unrelated)
another project, called Lerna,
publicly had a similar
debate. The issues involved are challenging, and it deserves careful
consideration regardless of how the issue is raised.