It’s ironic to me because from what I have seen in many technical online communities at least, places that have an established code of conduct seem to have an extremely difficult time dealing with opinions they happen to not like, which to me is the opposite of their own CoC terms such as tactful, respectful, safe and inclusive. Instead the opinions they don’t like are weaponized using the other negative terms they list such as anti-social, unhelpful, trolling, controversial etc. Basically I guess it’s all left up to interpretation by the mods as to how/if to handle those situations, which was already the case anyway.
The trouble with this is where do you draw the line? What you say is totally true and makes sense sometimes. The question is when is it actually that situation? I can imagine two situations:
one where the disliked opinion is “the Nazis were right”, and where the kicked person will probably argue back with
opposite of their own CoC terms such as tactful, respectful, safe and inclusive. Instead the opinions they don’t like are weaponized using the other negative terms they list such as anti-social, unhelpful, trolling, controversial etc.
as a way to try to legitimize their position, express their negative feelings at being excluded (because even if you’re a bad person, being excluded feels bad), and make the ban look to others like “oh, just a power-trip by bad management” and totally unjustified. Note that they might legitimately believe it is unjustified, that they probably are not twirling a mustache thinking in strategic terms of “how can I legitimize my position” and are just expressing their hurt feelings—but those are the things that happen when you make that argument.
one where the disliked opinion is “I don’t like dogs”, which absolutely does not warrant a kick except maybe in a panel of judges of a dog competition or something, where the part I quoted is a good representation of the situation—people are being intolerant when they should not be, the kicked person’s grievance is legitimate, and there might be a case of just personal dislike or power-tripping affecting the decision. When they argue with
opposite of their own CoC terms such as tactful, respectful, safe and inclusive. Instead the opinions they don’t like are weaponized using the other negative terms they list such as anti-social, unhelpful, trolling, controversial etc.
it is actually probably valid.
There are some actions/opinions where the view on whether it is the former situation or the latter situation is… controversial/unclear. I always wonder what happens when it is that kind of situation and how to deal with it.
I see where you are coming from, but to me it comes off as a little bit naive and reductionist.
That being said, I am thinking of this more globally, not necessarily solely in context of open source development (let alone this case in particular).
Why? I agree with him. CoCs are either a short redundant statement of implicit decent behaviour (do you really need to write down that people should be respectful?) or long lists of ambiguous rules that are used to pretend mod decisions are less arbitrary than they really are. Pointless in both cases.
If he had really done all these terrible things then would they really have not suspended him just because they didn’t have a CoC?
I reckon you could put useful things in a CoC, like stuff about enforcement procedures, and in fact PSF does have that… but then they go and:
the Python community Code of Conduct team may take any action they deem appropriate
And the list of inappropriate behaviour is so extensive (“Excessive swearing”?) that they basically have unchecked power anyway.
I wouldn’t be surprised if having an explicit CoC enforcement team is also likely to attract just the kind of people you don’t really want.
I just find the notion that all CoC policies are useless in all cases to be a bit broad and almost parochial.
There can be cases in a multi-cultural collective where a CoC helps everyone get on the same page.
A CoC can also act as a “policy of last resort” where you generally have a more laissez-faire approach, but you can refer to the CoC policy if someone repeatedly doesn’t get the message.
It all depends on the context of course, but staying that CoC policies are universally bad seems very simplistic.
It’s ironic to me because from what I have seen in many technical online communities at least, places that have an established code of conduct seem to have an extremely difficult time dealing with opinions they happen to not like, which to me is the opposite of their own CoC terms such as tactful, respectful, safe and inclusive. Instead the opinions they don’t like are weaponized using the other negative terms they list such as anti-social, unhelpful, trolling, controversial etc. Basically I guess it’s all left up to interpretation by the mods as to how/if to handle those situations, which was already the case anyway.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradox_of_tolerance
People latch on whatever little power they can get via these social constructs.
Office politics comes to mind here too.
The trouble with this is where do you draw the line? What you say is totally true and makes sense sometimes. The question is when is it actually that situation? I can imagine two situations:
as a way to try to legitimize their position, express their negative feelings at being excluded (because even if you’re a bad person, being excluded feels bad), and make the ban look to others like “oh, just a power-trip by bad management” and totally unjustified. Note that they might legitimately believe it is unjustified, that they probably are not twirling a mustache thinking in strategic terms of “how can I legitimize my position” and are just expressing their hurt feelings—but those are the things that happen when you make that argument.
it is actually probably valid.
There are some actions/opinions where the view on whether it is the former situation or the latter situation is… controversial/unclear. I always wonder what happens when it is that kind of situation and how to deal with it.
I see where you are coming from, but to me it comes off as a little bit naive and reductionist.
That being said, I am thinking of this more globally, not necessarily solely in context of open source development (let alone this case in particular).
Why? I agree with him. CoCs are either a short redundant statement of implicit decent behaviour (do you really need to write down that people should be respectful?) or long lists of ambiguous rules that are used to pretend mod decisions are less arbitrary than they really are. Pointless in both cases.
If he had really done all these terrible things then would they really have not suspended him just because they didn’t have a CoC?
I reckon you could put useful things in a CoC, like stuff about enforcement procedures, and in fact PSF does have that… but then they go and:
And the list of inappropriate behaviour is so extensive (“Excessive swearing”?) that they basically have unchecked power anyway.
I wouldn’t be surprised if having an explicit CoC enforcement team is also likely to attract just the kind of people you don’t really want.
I just find the notion that all CoC policies are useless in all cases to be a bit broad and almost parochial.
There can be cases in a multi-cultural collective where a CoC helps everyone get on the same page.
A CoC can also act as a “policy of last resort” where you generally have a more laissez-faire approach, but you can refer to the CoC policy if someone repeatedly doesn’t get the message.
It all depends on the context of course, but staying that CoC policies are universally bad seems very simplistic.