As someone that was not aware of the gag rule before the mailing list thread brought it up, I thought it was an abortion joke, especially with the "we would be required to say this is not an acceptable way of terminating a program". It is in the man page for abort(). The context clues are there, but the wrong ones.
So, on that level, it fails as a joke: if you aren't aware of the policy it's trying to criticize and make people aware of, it reads like a clunky abortion joke, and one that isn't very funny.
Yes, after the original writer had to explain it when it came up through a heated mailing list discussion about removing it partly because some misinterpreted it. That's not the excellence in communication you probably think it is. And it doesn't belong in a manual.
Even the term "gag rule" is a political position. The law was originally intended to keep national policy out of abortion, so consciences of abortion objectors won't be violated. It's commonly referred to as the Mexico City Policy. Similar rules have been in effect in the past on other highly controversial subjects like slavery.
Yes, it's vague enough that you can probably find what you want in it. For that reason alone, there probably is a legitimate case to remove it.
I think it's interesting how one's background can affect this too. I think everyone agrees that GNU & FSF are left-wing projects but where the "left" falls on different issues depends on where you're from. For RMS & most American lefties, "freedom" includes things like abortion rights. I think in other countries like Latin America & Catholic Europe the "left" generally favors restrictions on abortion. Lots of people that have become involved in the free software movement recently are from Latin America & RMS probably doesn't pick up on what his core audience believes on these things.
I don't know why you say the left in Latin America favors restrictions on abortion.
I am a Latin American and can say it's just not so - at least in the countries I know, the left is usually pushing for more sex ed, and more availability of abortion.
It'd be interesting to know _where_ in Latin America the left favors the restrictions on abortion - at least to document that perspective and share it around.
I was predominantly thinking of Hugo Chavez & Venezuela. Maybe I am not understanding his positions, but he was extremely left-wing (at least in the American context) on almost every issue except abortion. IIUC all countries in Latin America with the exception of Cuba & Uruguay have really bad abortion rights records. Maybe the left supports abortion rights, but at the least, it's not been enough support to effect changes to these laws.
Cuba & Venezuela are not within the normalcy of LatAm - different economic models, different politics. Mexico has good abortion laws - at least in the capital.
There are awful abortion rights records. Agreed - even in my own country, where we're fighting to have it allowed at least for extreme cases (nonviable fetus, or situations that put the mother at big risk, like ectopic pregnancies). Most LatAm countries at least allow abortion to save the mother's life.
Agreed that there's not been enough support to effect changes to the laws. It's an uphill battle; most of America is historically very right-leaning; military dictatorships and rights infringement were the norm for most of the 20th century in much of the subcontinent, and people who lived - but mostly those who _grew up_ - through that have the lingering effects of those predispositions.
But - yeah, the left is generally out of the circles of power in LatAm, and the laws - in particular abortion and other religion-endorsed observations - are very right leaning.
You can add Romania to that list even if it's not part of Catholic Europe. It's part of Orthodox Europe. Abortion was outlawed under communism, but after the fall of Iron Curtain it was immediately legalized.
The USSR was very big on getting women into the workforce (to help fill some of the enormous manpower shortage caused by WW2 casualties); improved reproductive health & choice obviously let women contribute more to industry & helped post-war rebuilding efforts.
Abortion was fully legalised in 1957 (after being controlled by communists since 1947): it was Nicolae Ceaușescu (the second Communist leader) who criminalised it in 1966, as part of his totalitarian autocrasy.
So, on that level, it fails as a joke: if you aren't aware of the policy it's trying to criticize and make people aware of, it reads like a clunky abortion joke, and one that isn't very funny.