He seems to have expressed a couple distinct arguments:

1. It isn't pedophilia if the person is sexually mature. Pedophilia is sex with prepubescent children.

2. He draws a distinction between statutory rape (can't legally say yes according to the law, but otherwise willing and sexually mature) and forcible rape (when someone says no). He made a point about how statutory rape wouldn't be considered rape if it happened in a different location (e.g. Italy) or if the person's birthday were slightly adjusted.

I agree with you that in the Epstein case you have a situation with a dramatic power imbalance. Stallman seems to consider Epstein a serial rapist (possibly for that fact?). He seems to be more pushing back on the pedophilia accusations.

Also - there seems to be a thread lost. It really looks like Epstein was a US Intelligence Officer filming powerful people having sex with young women (including foreign officials) to obtain leverage on them for the United States. This whole aspect of the conversation seems to have melted away in the various other controversies.

I also disagree with his opinion on this topic. Strongly.

But is it reasonable for someone to be essentially fired for having an incorrect opinion?

To defend Minsky and Prince Andrew, there’s no evidence they knew she was underage. She also appeared in a photo with Andrew and Ghisline Maxwell. Perhaps he knew she was underage but for a member of royalty to fly to a private island and have underage sex with 8+ girls at once is a serious allegation which is what she claimed. Maybe it’s true but at least one of the accused by her (the famous lawyer involved) has claimed to have evidence that she is lying — or more precisely, exaggerating her story.

My ex-girlfriend dated Prince Andrew (she was in her late 20s). I’ve been around some of these people in South Florida and LA. A lot of allegedly good people will ignore red flags but people openly targeting underage girls seems to be isolated to only one or two principals.

Of course, all of this is wrong —- even this concept of pleasure parties where young (over 18) girls are brought to billionaire parties often by younger guys. Turning regular girls into “sugar babies” or prostitutes is a major problem.

> Legally, sex with underaged people is rape regardless of consent

Yes and no. With a 17 year old, in some jurisdictions, it's rape in such and such degree, but in other jurisdictions, it's a separate crime, and in other jurisdictions it's not a crime at all. I think the stronger argument is that it's illegal/immoral, rather than getting stuck on a single word.

" I am sad that debate on this topic essentially can't happen."

It could happen if your point about power and consent was taken as a given (at least in the context of this topic).

> Legally, sex with underaged people is rape regardless of consent.

Yes, but how do you understand the wide age variations for "consent" worldwide?

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ages_of_consent_in_Asia

Did he resign because of these comments / opinions? Or you are commenting on his opinions

[edit] seems the resignation is due to the comments and I’m living under a rock

> Legally, sex with underaged people is rape regardless of consent.

There are many jurisdictions where this is not the case.

> a situation where simple "free choice" is made a mockery of.

I'm not so sure. "Free choice" today as defined by those on the left is "free to make choices independent of constraints imposed by personal capacity or personal resources", whereas it has historically been interpreted as "free to make choices independent of constraints imposed by other humans".

The problem with the former definition of free choice is that it requires encroaching on the latter definition of free choice.

If you have two people that are equally poor, both are equal in terms of having free choice under both definitions.

If one of those people becomes wealthy, they continue to be equal under the latter definition of free choice, but are unequal under the former definition even though nothing has changed in the circumstances of the one that became neither richer nor poorer than he was previously.

>That said, I think Stallman's position really is fundamentally wrong and problematic.

So you have the default opinion anyone in our society will have. I'm interested in what the heretic has to say why we are wrong.

However with what has happened to Stallman I doubt I ever will. A shame because something has gone hugely wrong when half of all children are thinking of suicide.