I would assume that many people here do some work on free software. If people producing free software are not able to comfortably develop free software using only free software, then we have lost something important.

Well, feel free to try and bridge that gap.

Emacs is likely to continue to exist for a long time, but the gap between it and modern IDEs is also likely to widen over that same timeline.

We likely have lost something. It's like global warming. Everybody talks about it as if they care, but if you still drive a car, do you actually care? No. Not enough to stop contributing to global warming.

It's the same thing with free software. I care, but not enough to stop me from using the easiest thing out there to use regardless of whether or not it's free.

Let’s not exaggerate; many people do care enough to have it affect their behavior. If there’s something you “care” about, but this does not affect any decisions you make in any way, do you actually care about it?

That's a foolish binary.

You can care about something, but have other contributing factors to your decision that override that care.

I care about the environment, but I still drive an internal-combustion vehicle, because NOT doing so isn't really an option where I live.

I care about issues of poverty, but enough to minimize all our expenses in order to give away more funds, because we want to be able to enjoy our lives.

It’s not meant to be taken as an absolute binary; it’s a question one should ask oneself. If you think you “care” about something, but never allow it to influence any decisions, you should really question yourself whether you actually care or not. As you say, the answer might very well be “Yes, I care, but there aren’t actually any options to express my precise level of care. The choice I make might be the same as if I didn’t care, but that’s because choices are limited, and my decision is ‘rounded up’ to the same choice I would have made if I did not care.” It is valuable to examine one’s own choices like this, because it causes you to notice when an alternative which is acceptable turns up.

The answer is: No, I don't actually care. I wouldn't say it's complete apathy though, I can still recognize that it's not exactly the most moral decision.

I agree, let's not exaggerate, if the overwhelming majority in aggregate acts in the exact same way, the aggregate action overwhelms the minority action.

In this case, most people don't care and share my viewpoint on the situation.