Equivalently, what you're saying is that the world got more dependent on secret, proprietary software, and that therefore those who wish to have freer systems should just give up.
the world got more dependent on secret, proprietary software, and therefore the pragmatic way is to concede a little territory to them, so that people can use Free Software at all.
Except it's a lose-lose situation: there will never be an end to those concessions, as long as secret software expands under the guise of firmware. And a hardline stance will alienate new generations and starve the movement. The endgame is no Free Software in either scenario.
"the world got more dependent on secret, proprietary software, and that therefore those who wish to have freer systems should just give up."
a "bad faith interpretation" of
"10 years ago it was not too hard to run a distro without firmware blobs on a laptop if you were cool with just getting a thinkpad, but modern intel hardware requires a blob for graphics so even that path is closed now. My 2022 thinkpad x1 needs blobs for graphics, wifi, bluetooth, and sound and I tried to find something modern that didn't need them and gave up eventually."
