unity-design team mailing list archive

[Michael Hall <mhall119@xxxxxxxxxx>]

This has nothing to do with unity design, please find a more appropriate
channel for these kinds of discussions.

Michael Hall
mhall119@xxxxxxxxxx


On 05/10/2012 10:48 PM, Jo-Erlend Schinstad wrote:
> I know there's work in progress on the Code of Conduct, but I wanted to
> address this topic here, because this is the only place in the Ubuntu
> Context I've ever had this problem. In order for everyone to properly
> understand the importance, I'll explain very briefly – and to the entire
> community – why this is so important to me and why it makes me want to
> step back from the community. But I primarily want to explain why I'm
> here and why it's important that people like myself don't go away –
> though everyone seems to want us to.
> 
> I begin reacting to religion a long time before my rational reasoning
> begins.
> 
> Religion is such a strong topic for me. My grandmother was brought up as
> extremely christian. And she's been a very powerful presense in my
> family. On my fathers side, everyone's non-religious, I think. But my
> grandmother was taught that everything nice was evil. Music, for
> instance. And I'm a musician. And cards. I'm a card artist. And games.
> I'm a pool player. Mostly everything I love, she was taught, is evil.
> However, the final years of her life, after my mother died, she was very
> lonely. And I spend large amounts of time with her, talking about life
> and death. And it was so important to me that my efforts to talk
> honestly to her, didn't affect her beliefs. That really took a
> commitment. Because I was always confident that I would be able to
> convince her that her beliefs didn't make any sense, but I didn't want
> to take it away from her - even subconciously. . I respect my elders and
> their religions. It doesn't mean they're right.
> 
> I've spent a very large part of my life talking about religion – all of
> the big ones – though I've never been one myself. I can argue with
> priests or mullahs or anyone. It is extremely interesting to me,
> understanding what makes people think the way they do. Whether they're
> different because of age, religion, sex or sanity, really doesn't matter
> that much to me, as long as I truly understand. That's also why I want
> to engage in the way people use computers. Because I don't only consider
> them as tools. I consider them as a new part of our reality. In my inner
> mind, I call it the hypersynapsis. I think it's bigger than computers
> and bigger than the internet, but definitely not bigger than humans.
> 
> Ubuntu was never sold to me. I joined because it immediately clicked
> with all of my strange personal vectors. I fight very hard for Ubuntu,
> but I also defend Microsoft – simply because much of the things people
> are saying, isn't true.
> 
> I hope I never have to defend my beliefs in any Ubuntu channel ever
> again. Because it's the one and only time I do. And it feels wrong to
> me, that I should be forced out of the community because of my
> non-religious beliefs – weird as they may be.
> 
> Jo-Erlend Schinstad
>