> I think there exist people who will enjoy that language, who will understand that language, and to whom that language speaks. My wife, possibly. My sister, almost certainly. Many others in my circle of friends, co-workers, and acquaintances.
But the desire to achieve self-expression through consumer choice is a fucking soul sickness. It's an empty simulation of meaningful self-expression. It's a (often deliberately!) useless substitute for actual political activity. Just because that kind of bullshit is pervasive and, in our society, widely effective for marketing purposes, doesn't mean it should be further propagated.
Free software is largely a refuge from that kind of bullshit, or at least the most cynical, cliche, shiny forms of it. Infesting Firefox with appeals of that kind is not the end of the world, I guess. But it is polluting the clean air I come to Firefox for in the first place with the same smog that's suffocating me everywhere else.
But the desire to achieve self-expression through consumer choice is a fucking soul sickness. It's an empty simulation of meaningful self-expression. It's a (often deliberately!) useless substitute for actual political activity. Just because that kind of bullshit is pervasive and, in our society, widely effective for marketing purposes, doesn't mean it should be further propagated.
Free software is largely a refuge from that kind of bullshit, or at least the most cynical, cliche, shiny forms of it. Infesting Firefox with appeals of that kind is not the end of the world, I guess. But it is polluting the clean air I come to Firefox for in the first place with the same smog that's suffocating me everywhere else.