I’ve noticed that you’re quite open about your political stance, identifying as leftists and expressing support for what you describe as “woke” ideology. I respect that you have opinions and the freedom to share them, but I’d like to offer some thoughts on why I believe it’s worth keeping politics separate from the LibreWolf project.
Politics is an incredibly difficult and messy topic. Most people—including myself—can’t claim to fully understand what the “right” kind of politics is. There’s so much propaganda, so many lies, and endless deceptions swirling around, and the worst part is that people often don’t even recognize when they’re being influenced by them. They genuinely believe they’re on the right side, but it’s hard to know for sure. That uncertainty, I think, makes politics a shaky foundation for anything beyond personal belief.
LibreWolf, to me and I’m sure to many others, is about something more concrete and universal: freedom, open source, and privacy. These are the core values that make your project stand out and attract users from all walks of life. Real freedom isn’t about picking a political side—it’s about empowering people through technology, regardless of what they believe. When politics gets mixed into a software project, it risks alienating parts of the userbase who might otherwise support it. You could lose people not because of the software’s quality, but simply because of a statement that doesn’t align with their views.
Take what’s happened with Firefox recently as an example. Their entanglement in political issues has left some users feeling like they can’t express themselves freely anymore, and it’s driven them to look for alternatives. LibreWolf has a chance to be that alternative—a browser that stays above the fray, focused purely on its technical merits and commitment to user empowerment. But if LibreWolf becomes perceived as politically aligned, it could turn away potential users who are just looking for a tool they can trust, not a platform for ideology.
I’m not saying you shouldn’t have your beliefs or express them in your personal lives—everyone’s entitled to that. But when those beliefs get tied to LibreWolf, it can complicate things for the project and its community. I hope you’ll consider keeping LibreWolf a space that’s purely about the software: a tool for freedom, privacy, and open-source ideals. That’s what makes it special, and that’s why people like me turn to it.
Thank you for taking the time to read this, and for all the work you put into LibreWolf—it’s a project worth preserving for what it does best.
Thanks, and regards,
A user who like your work
PS.: This is a reaction to #1978
I love AI-generated slop posts on the bug tracker.
Response from librewolf:
Thanks for enlightening us and making us realize the error of our ways! wasting our time with this issue.
“Politics is an incredibly difficult and messy topic. Most people—including myself—can’t claim to fully understand what the “right” kind of politics is. There’s so much propaganda, so many lies, and endless deceptions swirling around, and the worst part is that people often don’t even recognize when they’re being influenced by them. They genuinely believe they’re on the right side, but it’s hard to know for sure. That uncertainty, I think, makes politics a shaky foundation for anything beyond personal belief.”
This is such a common sentiment among adults in the US. It’s this way of using language and the appearance of intellect to essentially state you are absolutely baby-brained in the sphere of politics/sociology/philosophy etc. Of course, we understand that existing under the influence of capitalism mostly removes the tools and access to the knowledge to understand the problem is itself. So, you can get so many otherwise really educated, intelligent, and/or well-meaning people with this massive dumb hole in their brain. aka a centrist, an “apolitical”
can’t claim to fully understand what the “right” kind of politics is.
Motherfucker, if you don’t think your opinions are correct, then why do you have them? If I thought socialism didn’t have the right kind of politics, I wouldn’t be a socialist. There is a difference between opposing dogma within an ideology and not having any conviction with your ideology.
The best thing about this style of moderation is most of the chud dorks in your ranks will happily announce themselves as such as soon as you implement it and the signal to noise ratio goes up drastically. It’s my favorite thing about hexbear.
The biggest fault of libs is they don’t realise that Chuds have learnt to weaponise civility. They are so used to libs being willing to “listen to both sides” if they pretend to be “open to debate” that when an actual leftist goes “Lol fuck off I’m not playing your game” they don’t know what to do, get pissy and it makes them look like the unhinged ones.
Libs won’t do this because they want to be civil with the right. This makes them vulnerable to being taken advantage of by the right and suddenly they’ve lost the ability to defend themselves from them.
Patterns in the writing. There’s a specific AI bullet point list style that is incredibly obvious, but also the way it lays out a paragraph that reasons on whether something is one way or another is very common and always wishy washy.
Response from librewolf:
“Politics is an incredibly difficult and messy topic. Most people—including myself—can’t claim to fully understand what the “right” kind of politics is. There’s so much propaganda, so many lies, and endless deceptions swirling around, and the worst part is that people often don’t even recognize when they’re being influenced by them. They genuinely believe they’re on the right side, but it’s hard to know for sure. That uncertainty, I think, makes politics a shaky foundation for anything beyond personal belief.”
This is such a common sentiment among adults in the US. It’s this way of using language and the appearance of intellect to essentially state you are absolutely baby-brained in the sphere of politics/sociology/philosophy etc. Of course, we understand that existing under the influence of capitalism mostly removes the tools and access to the knowledge to understand the problem is itself. So, you can get so many otherwise really educated, intelligent, and/or well-meaning people with this massive dumb hole in their brain. aka a centrist, an “apolitical”
Motherfucker, if you don’t think your opinions are correct, then why do you have them? If I thought socialism didn’t have the right kind of politics, I wouldn’t be a socialist. There is a difference between opposing dogma within an ideology and not having any conviction with your ideology.
Some fascist nerd: “Debate meeee!!!”
Librewolf:
The best thing about this style of moderation is most of the chud dorks in your ranks will happily announce themselves as such as soon as you implement it and the signal to noise ratio goes up drastically. It’s my favorite thing about hexbear.
The biggest fault of libs is they don’t realise that Chuds have learnt to weaponise civility. They are so used to libs being willing to “listen to both sides” if they pretend to be “open to debate” that when an actual leftist goes “Lol fuck off I’m not playing your game” they don’t know what to do, get pissy and it makes them look like the unhinged ones.
Libs won’t do this because they want to be civil with the right. This makes them vulnerable to being taken advantage of by the right and suddenly they’ve lost the ability to defend themselves from them.
Reminds me of the Tom and Jerry bit. He hits the dog with a newspaper, then retreats to safety juuuuuuuuust past the line.
The dog is the troublemaker here you see, because he’s being loud and reacting to abuse
I’ve started noticing when redditors have used AI in their comments and berating them for it too.
Sometimes it’s painfully obvious sure, but how do you tell most of the time? AI is so reddit-voiced already.
Patterns in the writing. There’s a specific AI bullet point list style that is incredibly obvious, but also the way it lays out a paragraph that reasons on whether something is one way or another is very common and always wishy washy.
And this is why I do my best to post in a much more stream-of-thought method! Because no AI is doing that lol
Actually I’m just not the best writer and do this on my phone so editing is hard. But it makes a good excuse for why I do it
Real posters hit post before the thought is even finished streaming