I think the value of a CoC is merely to signal to people who have experienced abuse or disrespect in communities before (which would describe, I think, most women and people of color who have participated in technical communities for more than a short time) that the community is on their side when sexists or racists show up. That has some value. It doesn't really matter to the majority, and it doesn't actually alter how people behave (generally), nor does it really alter a project leaders ability to excise a toxic person. But, it does say, "We will excise toxic people. We will try to make you feel welcome here, even if you have been made to feel unwelcome elsewhere."
Even if that's all it does (which I think it probably is), it is enough to make it worth doing in most cases. (Which reminds me that I don't have a code of conduct on any of the open source projects or communities I work on, but I'll make it a project for the first quarter of this year.)
"I think the value of a CoC is merely to signal to people who have experienced abuse or disrespect in communities before (which would describe, I think, most women and people of color who have participated in technical communities for more than a short time) that the community is on their side when sexists or racists show up. "
If a COC becomes a baseline requirement for people to run projects and attract contributors, ISTM the people who don't care will just add COC's, and never enforce them.
You say "But, it does say, "We will excise toxic people. We will try to make you feel welcome here, even if you have been made to feel unwelcome elsewhere.""
It does not actually do that. It's one level removed from that. It's "we say we will excise toxic people.". It in fact, may be the case that you go to ask them to enforce it, and they say "sorry, don't care", even with a COC.
Then you are back to square 1. You essentially are trying to use the COC as a proxy for "communities that will care enough to put a stop to things" and i'm pretty much 100% it will not achieve this goal.
Of course a CoC can't make a community actually do anything. These are Open Source communities we're talking about here, and nobody can make anyone do anything at all.
You're alleging that a CoC is meaningless, but why implement a CoC, as a community, if you don't actually want more women and people of color becoming involved in your projects? The CoC is the signal saying, "We, as a community, want you to feel welcome here."
That's all I'm saying it does, and all I'm suggesting it can do, and I say that's sufficient cause to implement a CoC, if you want more women and people of color in your community.
So, to repeat, a CoC is a signal of desire to be inclusive. It is not a law, it is not a guarantee, it won't make assholes stop being assholes. It is a sign on the door saying, "We're gonna try to be welcoming. Come on in."
"You're alleging that a CoC is meaningless, but why implement a CoC, as a community, if you don't actually want more women and people of color becoming involved in your projects? The CoC is the signal saying, "We, as a community, want you to feel welcome here.""
See the part where i directly answer this:
"If a COC becomes a baseline requirement for people to run projects and attract contributors,"
IE if people stop going to projects without COC's, people will add COC's.
I'm not sure why you think anything else will happen.
"So, to repeat, a CoC is a signal of desire to be inclusive."
It is this second. As I said, if it becomes a thing people look for, it will no longer be that, because everyone will just add them and ignore them. It will no longer be a signal for what you are looking for. It will achieve precisely nothing.
Again, I'm honestly befuddled why you think anything else would happen
Do you really think normal people trying to start projects are going to say "well, i really want to attract contributors of all kinds, and it seems i have to have a COC, that i don't care about, to do that, but i guess it would just be wrong to have a COC if i don't care?"
Or do you think they are just going to say "well, i really want to attract contributors of all kinds, i better add a COC that i don't really care about".
I mean, this is already happening. How many projects are like our OP, and basically go and say "well, i should probably add a COC, but i don't really care".
You need look no further than things like yellow/pink ribbons/flag pins senators wear/etc to see what will happen. These things were once signals of people who cared. Now they are just social norms.
It may seem that way to a white dude (I'm a white dude, and I suffered from the delusion that tech communities were inclusive for decades), surrounded by white dudes. You're not alone...lots of people think tech is inclusive. I always assumed that our communities were more welcoming than usual, despite the evidence to the contrary in the form of such low historic participation by women and people of color in tech.
But, I've been told it is true from enough women and people of color that I believe it to be true. It's been discussed at great lengths by women and people of color on blogs, on mailing lists, on twitter, etc. I'm not sure what it would take to convince you, but I probably don't have the words to do it, so I'm not gonna try.
For people who acknowledge that our communities do not have a history of being inclusive, it is probably useful to post a CoC in order to signal that we are aware of that history of sexism and racism and acknowledge our willingness to take responsibility for it when it happens in communities we manage, if even in a small way.
>despite the evidence to the contrary in the form of such low historic participation by women and people of color in tech.
Are asians suddenly white and only black people are people of color ? I see asians significantly represented in the tech community (especially India with English history and emigration to west). And they are at all levels of tech from CEO to us regular code monkeys.
Do you believe that because Asian folks have reasonable (maybe even over-) representation in tech, that tech is an inclusive environment for all people of color, as well as women?
Edit: And, another thing!...I believe I've personally seen more anti-Asian racism in tech than most other kinds of racism (though the extreme level of sexism in tech far surpasses any racism I've seen). Fake Indian accents and jokes about English skills abound among nerd circles, for example. It may merely be because I know more Asian tech workers than folks from other races and have worked in environments with a reasonably large Asian population. It is possible to ignore racism or sexism and power through and keep doing your job, but it doesn't mean the environment is welcoming or inclusive.
>Do you believe that because Asian folks have reasonable (maybe even over-) representation in tech, that tech is an inclusive environment for all people of color, as well as women?
IMO tech industry is the most meritocratic sector I've seen, even more the little I've seen from academia. Note - it's far from being some ideal meritocracy, there's plenty of PHB, politics and plain old corporate bullshit, but low barriers to entry, highly competitive environment, high impact work with low iteration time and the scaling model of software really helps steer incentives towards actually hiring the best person for the job.
I believe the reason these other groups are not represented in tech is mostly because of factors outside of tech industry (social) and tech industry shouldn't be reaching backwards to support underrepresented groups simply because they are underrepresented. If the society sees a problem with this imbalance then they are free to fix the issue at the source instead of trying to fix a thing that works relatively well.
I don't want to keep harping on the "as a white dude" theme, here, but that's what I keep hearing. As white dudes we don't see race or gender, because we aren't made to see it in our daily lives.
Tech is a meritocracy for white dudes. For everyone else, it is a little bit meritocracy, and a little bit toxic environment where they are made to feel their minority status on a regular basis. I'm not saying this because I want white dudes to feel guilty, or I don't want white dudes to continue to feel welcome in tech communities (again, I'm a white dude). But, until we acknowledge that women at tech conferences are simply not treated the same as white dudes; black folks are not treated the same as white applicants when applying for jobs; trans folks are gendered incorrectly casually or jokingly (I've seen it happen here at HN numerous times); we're contributing to the problem.
"tech industry shouldn't be reaching backwards to support underrepresented groups simply because they are underrepresented"
So, I'm confident you aren't intending to be racist or sexist...but, do you realize what you're suggesting here? That welcoming women and people of color into our communities is to "reach backwards"? Are you genuinely suggesting there are no women or people of color that are capable of contributing to projects you work on? That their contribution would be detrimental to a project?
They are underrepresented in many communities because they have been pushed out, repeatedly. Certainly, there are systemic problems, as well. And until we have large numbers of female hackers and black and brown hackers in the world at large, we won't see significant numbers of them in our communities. But, we've been told by women who are hackers that they've been made to feel unwelcome, unsafe, harassed. We've been told by black and brown folks who are hackers (sometimes impressively so) that they've experienced racism. And, that those situations have led to them leaving or never joining in the first place. Why do so many white dudes want to insist those stories are lies?
"If the society sees a problem with this imbalance then they are free to fix the issue at the source instead of trying to fix a thing that works relatively well."
So, it is society's responsibility to make the open source projects we work on more inclusive? I don't follow. I think we should start with what we have the most direct control over. I have commit bits on a handful of large open source projects. I can make something happen there. I don't have "commit bits" on the education system, the police, the federal or local government, television or movies, or much of anything else.
In short, you say we're trying to fix something that isn't broken...but, I believe women and people of color when they tell me that it is broken for them. I don't see it; it's never been broken for me. But, I'm white and male in America. The system (whatever "system" we're talking about) is pretty much always functional for me.
> As white dudes we don't see race or gender, because we aren't made to see it in our daily lives.
Speak for yourself. I've worked in print and manufacturing before starting programming - I've seen factory workers disregard female supervisor orders and regularly fake the tasks, commenting on her "lack of sex", "hormones", even to their face and regularly behind their back etc. At the same time they would shut up and do their shit when told the same thing by a male super. I've seen old department manager lead print finish section with a bunch of women in low skill/paying roles literally talk to them like they are his lessers and he was actively hostile and attempted to sabotage a woman who got hired as an engineer (which outranks him in terms of skill).
I've seen real sexism, and I've also seen discrimination based on nationality where it actually impacts people every day jobs and hiring/firing/promotions.
Calling the things I see described as examples of sexism and racism and what I've personally seen on job is a joke compared to what women and foreigners had to go through in low skilled industries with more uneducated and older people.
Programmers like you live in a bubble - I see people like you complain about culture/wages/work conditions in tech industry without having any grasp on what the world looks like outside of tech. I've met guys who work with electricity or work on highly dangerous positions where their life is at risk at any moment and your first mistake could very well be your last, people working in hazardous environments that 100% take a physical tool on you (eg. high probability you will end up with cancer and the likes) - and even with 20+ years of experience at the same job they were making about the same what I was getting when I started coding and my pay only grew since then. I earned more than a person who went through med school and if I fucked up nobody died or got disabled. Programmers have it super good right now and the industry is filled with highly educated smart people
The public discussion about this stuff doesn't necessarily justify 'most' but it absolutely demonstrates 'many'. And 'many' seems to me to be quite sufficient to justify CoC adoption as being positive overall.
This isn't exactly scientific, but just go over to YouTube and read the comments whenever a woman gives a technical talk. Now imagine a role reversal where, whenever a straight male gives a talk, you can count on it receiving numerous comments from gay men saying they love a guy with brains, or how badly they want to fuck the guy (or that he isn't attractive enough for that), or that he should go back to the garage and fix me a motorcycle. Maybe it's only a small minority of comments, but it doesn't take much to make the whole environment feel hostile.
I just pulled up a video that I remember having particularly bad comments, and the comments were gone. I guess that channel does have a code of conduct, even if it's not formalized. I don't know that publishing a CoC document "solves" anything, but at the very least it acknowledges that the sort of conduct I was illustrating does exist and should be discouraged.
Perhaps it's along the same lines as the "don't piss in my pool" sign. Some visitors may see it as a sign that you care about water quality and will feel safer jumping in. Others might wonder if it indicates that a lot of people do piss in your pool.
Arbitrary notions of safety and conduct. People know how they should conduct themselves, and those who will do something wrong don't care.
Arbitrary notions of power. Does enacting this over the members of this community improve anything? No. There are no issues within it to begin with. Nobody is rampantly "pissing in the pool" on a daily basis, hell even monthly basis at that.
Arbitrary notions of acknowledgment. Do you read through every ToS you've agreed to? No.
Communities can be healthy without a CoC, or unhealthy with one. But having a CoC sends a big, clear message to women and other groups frequently marginalized in the tech scene that your project is healthy and welcoming.
Here's why that's a big deal: joining an open source project is an investment. If you are a woman, or black, or trans, or god forbid, some combination thereof in tech, you really don't want to become invested in a community that will at some point treat you like shit. And let's be real guys, many, many communities do treat women and minorities like shit.
A CoC, and just as importantly, the discussion surrounding one, is a simple sign that a community is a place where you can be a woman or a minority and contribute to open source without fear of harassment, abuse, marginalization, and other dangers faced by non-white-dudes in tech.
Now, me personally, I couldn’t give a crap whether a project has a CoC or not.
Frankly, if someone acts irredeemably toxically in this project, I won’t feel like I need to have a CoC to justify taking corrective action — I’ll just take the action
So, I’m definitely notgoing to “require” a CoC; if someone acts like an ass then they can expect me to take some kind of action.
But then comes out with:
I’m pretty disheartened by the intensely negative response this suggestion has drawn;
I'm at a loss as to why he didn't just let the discussion roll for a bit without expressing his "disheartened" feelings and if the outcome from active members is "we don't think this is a good idea" then let it go. He's already stated that thus far the project has no known issues regarding conduct and that anyone being an asshat dickhead would be dealt with anyway.
I disagree with him both about the usefulness and harm of CoCs. There are jackasses, and not having preemptively adopted a CoC, they can leverage the lack of clear rules to divide the community.
On the other-hand, once you have rules, there are some people who for some reason or another go out of their way to argue that a behavior violates/does not violate the rules and completely ignore whether the behavior was benign or malignant, which is what one should really care about.
> once you have rules, there are some people who for some reason or another go out of their way to argue that a behavior violates/does not violate the rules and completely ignore whether the behavior was benign or malignant
Maybe projects can adopt CoCs that address that too, and cover both sides of the coin.
I have attempted to ascertain the need of a CoC for this community by reading through the mailing list and issues... The more that I read through it, the less I see the need for one. It simply appears as a power play from this individual user, as such is identified by this lengthy blog post which signals some red flags.
The previous owner says it all himself pretty clearly:
> The current attempts to adopt CoC in various FOSS projects are IMO doomed for similar reasons. It has zero effect on abusers (no abuser thinks of himself as an abuser) and the message it sends to decent folks is: "There's an elite in the community that will decide what's good and what's bad and enforce it by censoring your emails/posts/contributions." Which in turn erodes trust within the community and, consequently, its ability to spontaneously deal with abuse.
I found Martin Sustrik's comment[1] very informative. It is a bit of history and also states some of the fears of this CoC additions to projects. His idea about "abuse postmortems" seems a lot more workable.
I don't understand. The people who are -1, what do they care if it is adopted? Is CoC that controversial? Are personal attacks, doxing, trolling and slurs part of their daily routine they will be seriously inconvenienced by inability to use them?
---
* The use of sexualized language or imagery
* Personal attacks
* Trolling or insulting/derogatory comments
* Public or private harassment
* Publishing other's private information, such as physical or electronic addresses, without explicit permission
* Other unethical or unprofessional conduct
---
As a maintainer they should have just said "There is a CoC now. Check it out: <link>. Happy new year everyone".
I have been partly and admin of a urban terror server for years with my team.
This game has always been a troll magnet of milfan boys with too much testosterone. I was one of them, except I had a girl's name.
By kick/banning appropriately with clear reasons we (as a team), we made even women and teens feel welcome (shit happens). I kicked/banned consistently people for personal reasons (I don't like discriminating people). I also kicked/banned other people because they were not enjoyable. So were the others doing. We never asked permission to have a server we would enjoy ourselves playing, we were paying for it. And it was bringing people. And it was fun for everybody, even women and kids.
CoC is just an excuse for failure and lacking balls and that thinking just being "the owner of a digital place" makes you a leader.
Money, title, even skills don't make you a leader. Just succeeding in leading.
A CoC lets people stretch something to fall under it to get someone else punished if enforced properly and by the letter.
If it isn't enforced by the letter - why does any of this bullshit need to be mentioned? If someone's being a dick, they'll be addressed and dealt with for being a dick. No CoC needed.
What is the difference between the following two statements?
"We've received a complaint that could be construed as violating Section 3 Subsection B of the CoC. So I'm going to have to ask you to quit it or leave."
People have different definitions of what constitutes acceptable conduct. A CoC acknowledges this and takes some steps to make sure people are on the same page. Even if it isn't enforced to the letter, some people need a reminder. I think there's also a hope (maybe not true in practice) that having a CoC is a positive signal to people who feel marginalized in other communities.
> What is the difference between the following two statements?
Nothing, I like the second. And the second one will be used anyway. But I was talking here more about the people who gave it a -1. Maintainer spent his personal time and put some work into creating a guide. So let the guide be.
If it is not enforced, it is not enforced. It will just stay there. If it is enforced I might help people kick abusers off a mailing list or IRC channel.
Perhaps I would understand if it was a question of well we don't have a guide, how wants to come up with one, or let's go write one. Then perhaps discussion its value vs time it takes to get it edited and committed might be in order. But if it is already done, just adopt it. There is nothing onerous or crazy in there.
If it doesn't work or causes terrible problem down the road -- throw it away.
Its philosophical. Note how you discuss if the CoC is controversial, not the maintainer wanting to enforce it, or how you phrase it as "there is a CoC" rather than "the maintainer will apply force as necessary".
Folks with agency or autonomy will personally act to eliminate harassment, without need for rules, for example. Troll on my turf, I will ban you. Not some set of rules taking action, a human (that being me) will exert authority (that being the mighty banhammer) and that's how it will be. There are no abstract rules or rule lawyering involved.
The CoC view is passively sugar coating some abstract set of rules which will enforce itself, kinda. Its very weird because the person applying the CoC is too passive and has too little agency to, say, wield the banhammer and eliminate the threat without need of formal rules and regulations. Yet, has enough agency to force everyone else to work under a CoC, which simultaneously implies the same people that can't autonomously be trusted to exhibit common sense will none the less be forced by the rules to apply the rules they were too timid to apply by themselves without the CoC. Its very weird logic twisting.
If you trust individual leaders, the CoC is useless because the have the agency to wield the banhammer with no need for rules. If you don't trust the leaders, the CoC is useless because they won't enforce it.
So what is the use of a CoC? Well, for one thing instead of banhammer swinging we can raise awareness and have a debating party about what violates the abstract rules. No one can be kicked out without a long painful debate. Its a rule's lawyer's paradise rather than a developers paradise.
CoC's are very passive, someone else will enforce the rules. That paradoxically leads to worse behavior. Pretending you're not in a benign despotism merely confuses and slows down necessary responses by all concerned.
Its sort of a generic opposition to all that is Dilbertian, along the lines of not requiring casual IRC / SMS message conversations to be conducted as per "Robert's Rules of Order" Its not that the rules are in themselves bad, its that if you think you need Roberts Rules of Order for IRC something is hopelessly off the tracks and you can only hope you don't show up as a satire in a Dilbert or xkcd cartoon.
Maybe a bad bar analogy is the bartender tosses out obnoxious drunks. Installing a set of formal rules that drunkards must be formally recognized by the chair of the meeting before speaking as per Roberts Rules and if you don't then an abstract someone should toss you out implies you're probably in one messed up bar.
In this case the use is that the maintainer took the time to create it. You can argue that it is useless. Even the maintainer seem to largely agree. So why not have it? It is already there. Why show negativity.
A CoC is a bit like a trademark. To be useful it has to be enforced. So it can just sit there, and if nobody bothers to look at, it will just occupy some extra bytes on some server (Github).
> That paradoxically leads to worse behavior.
Yeah, it might be right. But it is a hypothetical. Let's think of a positive hypothetical upside -- for example the first thing comes to mind is it sends a message to minorities, women, those who are shy, beginners that this project is approachable. We are attempting to be sensitive and welcoming by at least spending time to create a CoC. It is a general message perhaps as well "We are aware these kind bad things happen in the programming community so we did something about". That's it.
People resent being regulated, even if that regulation has no practical effect on their behavior. Most people who are nice are nice because they choose to be. Having someone come in and tell you "you better be nice or else" is kind of insulting and robs you of a bit of agency. I think that's a natural human reaction.
That being said, I'm generally in favor of Codes of Conduct because I think the good they do outweighs the bad. But I don't buy your argument that it's a totally neutral document and people should just not vote because it's "already there".
Don't know that's why I said it was "a positive hypothetical upside". It was in response to gp post about "well what if it has a has a negative effect somehow". So I just replied with an equally un-substantiated claim "Well it could have a positive effect too".
>Are personal attacks, doxing, trolling and slurs part of their daily routine they will be seriously inconvenienced by inability to use them?
Just because they don't agree with having CoC doesn't mean they do anything CoC disallows. The same with people fighting for free speech or freedom of association - at least one of them is not a hate speech using KKK member.
Nice passive-aggressive personal attack though. Maybe CoC isn't that bad idea after all.
> It's purely a signaling issue, the text of the CoC is completely irrelevant.
That's what I am thinking. Why not signal that "yeah these issues exist, we took 10 minutes to create some guide and put it on Github or some place". I understand if it wasn't already done, and its usefulness has to be weighed against the time it takes to do it. But it was already done. Just approve it and move on. Why drive-by and throw -1's out of the window at it.
RE signaling issue - those people who are opposed to CoC are reacting because the CoC trend did not appeared from nowhere - it's the result of the SJW narrative that's been spreading around the Internet. So by accepting the CoC they feel they're legitimizing (what they perceive as) the culture of outrage and censorship that hides beneath the talk of preventing abuse.
See the original proposal in the mailing list. The maintainer drafted the CoC contents. Shared the link. Asked people what they thought. A lot of them simply replied back with -1. Some explained their choice, but a lot didn't.
I would guess because it can become dangerous to one's career to explain in these circumstances but they believe it to be a bad thing. -1 is a vote. The more words you put down the easier it is the interpret what you say in the worst possible way.
Heck, following the wrong person on Twitter gets you on a ban list, so expressing opposition at all should be taken seriously.
The explosive anger at the Linux Code of Conflict betrays that this fight has been less over needing clear rules as it is the need of some people to force their particular set of rules in as many places as possible.
I disagree with him regarding the usefulness of CoCs -- spelling out the rules of engagement can be powerful -- but I respect that he put his money where his mouth is, so to speak.
I also disagree with him about CoC's, though for a reason that he doesn't really address.
Anybody who has lived for long enough knows at least one person who can be unkind out of obliviousness, not knowing better, or not being aware of social cues.
Also, people in disagreements get mad or passionate, and that tends to incite people to cross the line of professional respect. Passion is good, hostility is not. I've had to remind normally kind people that I manage to "not do ____ again" on multiple occasions, with the implicit threat of firing them.
My conclusion from my own experiences is that "don't be a dick" is not universally understood, and people will make mistakes, often unintentionally. So I think a CoC is useful as one of many different ways any organization has to remind its members to be kind. It's still up to the administrators to enforce things, but a CoC is a useful reminder especially to incoming members to be aware of their conduct.
I tend to agree with you. I do think that the common sense "don't be a dick" shouldn't need to be explicitly expressed as a rule we all follow. But it should also be common sense not to put your hands near a spinning metal blade, but we have those warnings on lawnmowers. I think where a CoC provides it value is defining the procedures for when the CoC is violated, which it no doubt will be.
In this context I'm implying CoC do not "prevent" nor the lack thereof causes bad behavior.
This BTW seems to get to the crux of what half of his decision was about. If he thinks CoC are worthless, that is not the same thing as believe abuse should be a common occurrence.
We should be embarrassed that they're necessary for some groups to feel safe.
As we see in this thread, whether CoC "mean something" or "are needed" aren't absolutes — clearly they are to some, and aren't to others. The key for me is that they're not important to people who don't need them to feel safe, and vice-versa.
CoCs do layout some rules for engagement but I believe there should be a positivity in the engagement itself. There should not be abuse in any form , either by disrespecting others or pinching others that they are abusing this segment of Coc (which might happen in some cases) . Disrespecting others in any form is not acceptable and hence I think Coc may not be a perfect solution . I can completely see his point .
You may think they are "worthless" but clearly some people think they they have value.
Which one do you think is more poisonous? Making a fuss over the maintainer wanting to impose one or just accepting that someone else sees value in something you don't and agreeing to the CoC.
They are not worthless. They are a form of social signalling showing who's trendy, who thought of it first, a form of personal aggrandizement. The fundamental outlook behind them is the idea the general public is inherently inferior, savage, and without rules it would be a world eternally red in tooth and claw, and only I am a superior enough leader, better than all the rest of you, to set the moral and ethical standards of our culture, now everyone get in line behind my moral authority, and appreciate my public declaration of my own superiority. They're obnoxious, unnecessary, and counterproductive, but not worthless.
Even if that's all it does (which I think it probably is), it is enough to make it worth doing in most cases. (Which reminds me that I don't have a code of conduct on any of the open source projects or communities I work on, but I'll make it a project for the first quarter of this year.)