In the last 5 to 10 years everything seems to suck: product's and services quality plummeted, everything from homes to cars to food became really expensive, technology stopped to help us to be something designed to f@ck with us and our money, nobody seems to be able to hold a job anymore, everyone is broke. Life seems worse in general.
Richard Stallman is the patron saint of Open Source. Stallman, like all "saints" is a pig headed extremist who is maniacally single minded. I'm very glad he came along.
Richard Stallman is indeed a pivotal figure, but not in Open Source. He founded the Free Software Movement, which is distinct from Open Source. The Free Software Movement emphasizes the ethical implications and the users freedoms, while Open Source focuses more on the practical benefits of sharing code.