Important O-Week info: Our website is still undergoing major upgrades. Some of the contents here may be out-of-date.

Search

Reinhart Previano K.

Do you love to Ctrl-K, Ctrl-/, or / ? Now you can do three of them (>_ )!

No results so far...

Contact Information

• (Updated )

A reminder on fascism in free, libre, open-source (FLOSS) projects and communities.

Reinhart Previano Koentjoro's profile picture

Reinhart Previano Koentjoro (@reinhart)

Published on Logs of the SYSTEM

Share Copy Link Print PDF Embed Share to Email Share to SMS Yahoo! Share to Yahoo! Mail Mastodon Share to Mastodon Share to KakaoStory Messenger Share to Messenger Pocket Share to Pocket Flipboard Share to Flipboard Pinterest Share to Pinterest Reddit Share to Reddit Y Combinator Share to Hacker News Odnoklassniki Share to Odnoklassniki Blogger Share to Blogger Pleroma Share to Pleroma Share to Friendica Share to KakaoTalk 1Artboard 1 copy 2 Share to Snapchat Xing Share to Xing Share to Misskey LINE Share to LINE Evernote Share to Evernote WhatsApp Share to WhatsApp LiveJournal Share to Livejournal Diaspora Share to Diaspora Share to Gmail Threads Share to Threads Threema Share to Threema Share to X Tumblr Share to Tumblr Buffer Share to Buffer LinkedIn Share to LinkedIn Mail.Ru Share to mail.ru VK Share to VKontakte Trello Share to Trello Facebook Share to Facebook Bluesky Share to Bluesky Skype Share to Skype Hatena Bookmark Share to Hatena Bookmark! Share via MastodonShare Telegram Share to Telegram WordPress Share to WordPress.com

Embed

This website supports oEmbed. To quickly use oEmbed, just copy this site's link to your oEmbed-supported apps and websites like WordPress.

Alternatively, copy and paste the HTML code below to embed this post in your website.

($_ )! We have made this thing responsive, but recommend at least 512x512 pixels for best results.
<iframe src="https://reinhart1010.id/blog/2025/05/01/a-reminder-on-fascism-in-free-libre-open-source-floss-projects-and-communities?embed" height="512" width="512" style="border:none;"><a href="{{ $canonical }}">https://reinhart1010.id/blog/2025/05/01/a-reminder-on-fascism-in-free-libre-open-source-floss-projects-and-communities</a></iframe>
Preview

You may call any names from L (the forbidden word in major FLOSS communities, referring to a person) to P (that top YouTuber who recently advertised Linux). But I would argue that people won't be able to reject certain people from using any Free Software or Open Source software for being "fascist" or "nazi".

In fact, the licenses of your software itself still do not prohibit your users from adopting a certain ideology, belief, or a set of political intentions in order to use, clone, modify, and redistribute your software.

Your "inclusive" covenants and Code of Conducts do, but it would not stop people to fork out from your community and continue working with your software through their intended ways.

I would recall the Debian's decision to drop a specific key software because its license contains a specific phrase:

"The Software shall be used for Good, not Evil."

With the committee claiming this as nonfree and removed them from Debian repositories, and also impacted other software for inclusion in Debian, we may imply that you, the greater Free Software and Open Source community, generally implied that your software may be legally used for "evil".

So now, you have seen the consequences of your past actions. You should be inspired instead to include the fugitive phrase in your licenses, including your definition of "Good" as something that is ethical, supportive, inclusive, non-discriminatory, anti-ableist, LGBTQIA+ (and allies) proud and owned.

But it's too late. Your licenses are more difficult to be revoked than ever, casting bad spells to people who flexed themselves for choosing the ways of the Copyleft.

From the Open Source Initiative (OSI), 17 years ago:

We never talk about Open Source in terms of religion or philosophy, morality or ethics. There is simply no place for one to be fundamentalistic about Open Source. If Open Source works for you, great! (We told you so.) If it doesn’t work for you, that’s too bad, but we understand. We won’t call you a bad person, we won’t excommunicate you, we won’t shun you, we won’t even eat crackers in your bed.

Open Source Initiative. (2008). "open source fundamentalist". https://opensource.org/blog/open-source-fundamentalist

If you consider "non-fascist" to be the future of your users and your community, maybe it's time to stop doing Free Software and Open Source today.

Really. Stop the adoption of today's licenses.

Make new "antifascist open-source" licenses that effectively stop fascists (and probably Silicon Valley companies and VCs, too) from using and stealing your hard work.

Leave GNU/Linux and make new pieces of software from scratch, as your new licenses won't be likely compatible with the licenses of your past software.

Make new definitions of "free" and "nonfree", knowing that your new inclusive license would be technically nonfree anyway.

Make new compilers and operating systems. Make new committees and organizations. Make new software and hardware.

The freedom comes back to you now, but remember: you should drop your sexist hardware ports (especially DC jacks, Ethernet, and USB; they believe that shy female connectors can only and only connect to male connectors) and pave new way for new set of inclusive ones.

Share Copy Link Print PDF Embed Share to Email Share to SMS Yahoo! Share to Yahoo! Mail Mastodon Share to Mastodon Share to KakaoStory Messenger Share to Messenger Pocket Share to Pocket Flipboard Share to Flipboard Pinterest Share to Pinterest Reddit Share to Reddit Y Combinator Share to Hacker News Odnoklassniki Share to Odnoklassniki Blogger Share to Blogger Pleroma Share to Pleroma Share to Friendica Share to KakaoTalk 1Artboard 1 copy 2 Share to Snapchat Xing Share to Xing Share to Misskey LINE Share to LINE Evernote Share to Evernote WhatsApp Share to WhatsApp LiveJournal Share to Livejournal Diaspora Share to Diaspora Share to Gmail Threads Share to Threads Threema Share to Threema Share to X Tumblr Share to Tumblr Buffer Share to Buffer LinkedIn Share to LinkedIn Mail.Ru Share to mail.ru VK Share to VKontakte Trello Share to Trello Facebook Share to Facebook Bluesky Share to Bluesky Skype Share to Skype Hatena Bookmark Share to Hatena Bookmark! Share via MastodonShare Telegram Share to Telegram WordPress Share to WordPress.com

Embed

This website supports oEmbed. To quickly use oEmbed, just copy this site's link to your oEmbed-supported apps and websites like WordPress.

Alternatively, copy and paste the HTML code below to embed this post in your website.

($_ )! We have made this thing responsive, but recommend at least 512x512 pixels for best results.
<iframe src="https://reinhart1010.id/blog/2025/05/01/a-reminder-on-fascism-in-free-libre-open-source-floss-projects-and-communities?embed" height="512" width="512" style="border:none;"><a href="{{ $canonical }}">https://reinhart1010.id/blog/2025/05/01/a-reminder-on-fascism-in-free-libre-open-source-floss-projects-and-communities</a></iframe>
Preview

Reinhart Previano Koentjoro
Reinhart Previano Koentjoro
Citra Manggala Dirgantara
Citra Manggala Dirgantara

A Reinhart company

Products

Company