I have contributed to the venerable open source iOS and macOS news reader app NetNewsWire for years. What follows is the comment I wrote in the thread about a tweet on NetNewsWire’s Slack workspace. The comment is addressed to the team and is about my ability to be on the team and contribute to the project.

I was struck by the conviction of this tweet. It surprises me that it seems the team does not believe people can legitimately hold diverse views about abortion, because the kinds of questions it raises are so obviously complicated. For example, the essential question abortion poses is this: when is it okay to kill a human being? This is — at the very least — a complicated philosophical question that most people do not have the competency to clearly reason about without training. So it should be quite obvious to expect (and we do find) many well-meaning truth seekers to arrive at different views.

Perhaps the team does think people can legitimately hold diverse views about abortion. But then it would seem the recent tweets do not meet the Code of Conduct. Inviting people to not use the app does not strike me as “[u]sing welcoming and inclusive language” or “[b]eing respectful of differing viewpoints and experiences”. It would also seem the tweets undermine the reason for writing an RSS reader by introducing barriers to people getting news via the open web. Suggesting agreement with the beliefs of the development team as a precondition for using NetNewsWire undermines its part as an answer to the web we want, by creating division, alienating and discouraging people from taking control of their news and reducing the damage of social media with its algorithms, echo chambers and virtue signalling. More importantly, people have less opportunity to think for themselves, a skill quickly overcome by the psychological forces at work in social media.

Since it seems the team has instead absolutely judged one belief the only acceptable belief and rejected others, then the team may want to consider changing the Code of Conduct and the web site’s reason for writing an RSS reader to include agreement or indifference with the team on controversial issues. If I have somehow misinterpreted the absoluteness of the team’s judgements, but there is still the desire as people “in the world” to contribute something to the conversation, perhaps the tweets could have modelled the kinds of virtues it hopes of NetNewsWire users by sharing, for them to read and think about, a feed or two the team trusts that offers, in their estimation, the best opposing arguments or most insightful variety of commentary about abortion. For example, The Philosophy Paperboy site can give you an RSS feed of search results for diverse philosophy papers about abortion.

I can understand the team having certain philosophical beliefs and behaving accordingly. The tweets follow from these beliefs and so do the tweets in sympathy. However, I consider myself — perhaps presumptuously — as part of the team, implementing, supporting and chipping away on Swift Concurrency improvements for the Feedly integration. So the words of these tweets are placed in my mouth. There is much to agree with. I believe in the right to privacy. I believe women’s rights are human rights. I believe women have a right to choose to have children. I believe women have a right to healthcare, including those whose lives are in danger because of pregnancy. But I have different philosophical beliefs that determine abortion to be immoral because it involves intentionally and unjustly killing a human being with an intrinsic right to the pursuit of a good life. So I do not believe “abortion is healthcare” because, simply put, it is a contradiction in terms.

It saddens me to say that with these tweets and given the moral seriousness of abortion, the NetNewsWire team has excluded me from further contributions, unless I have reason to believe that people with differing views beyond the purpose of the app will be welcomed and included. I sincerely thank you for your support of my contributions and your hard work to make the world a better place through great quality software. Thank you for the inspiration you all give to the developer community. I would love the chance to buy you a coffee, beer or whiskey and talk with you if we meet in person. I have been a fan of your work for more than half my life and I remain so, even if I disagree with the team about other things. I will miss you all and hope to be back. Be well!