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Effective immediately I am stepping down from the Nodejs TSC

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Re: Effective immediately I am stepping down from the Nodejs TSC

#31

Post by jamescostian »

syshum wrote: post #10
mattnewton wrote: post #2

I missed all this, what did rvagg do? Why are some people upset enough to try to vote him off the island, and leave when it didn't happen?

Seems he committed the cardinal sin of expressing support for Free Speech and questioning some aspects of Codes of Conduct. One can not even question the codes of conduct, they are written on stone and are beyond criticism and questioning...

Society has been telling people to shut up for a very, very long time. Stepping down from a position because you disagree with someone != "Free Speech"

If you really think disagreeing with someone and expressing it constitutes as limiting Free Speech, then aren't you limiting Free Speech right now?

Re: Effective immediately I am stepping down from the Nodejs TSC

#33

Post by rocqua »

geofft wrote: post #16
curtisblaine wrote: post #12

So he dared to be in favour of anti-CoC article in one of his Twitter posts and thus unleashed the SJW brigade? What an heinous crime.

I think that's an uncharitable reading. It's one thing to be anti-CoC. It's another thing to be anti-CoC when you're on a committee whose job is to maintain and enforce the CoC. There's nothing dishonorable about saying "I don't think I agree with the goals of the job that I am doing, so I will let someone else do it," but he didn't do that. It's sort of like going to work for customs while being a strong believer in…

That analogy is somewhat wrong. A simple reading makes it boil down to a simple question. If you disagree with how a system implements its goals, do you change that system from within or from without? Noting that sometimes, 'improving from within' vs 'sabotage' is a matter of perspective.

You can disagree with rules and still enforce them. In cases where judgement calls need to be made, you then use your own judgement. This is only unreasonable when the rules are perfect, or judgement calls are made when the rules are clear.

Re: Effective immediately I am stepping down from the Nodejs TSC

#34

Post by strictnein »

The unredacted details still feel like they're missing something:

https://web.archive.org/web/20170821212745/https://github.co...

"...Rod’s first action was to apologize to a contributor who had been repeatedly moderated. Rod did not discuss the issue with other members of the CTC/TSC first. The result undermined the moderation process as it was occurring"

"Rod did not moderate himself when asked by another foundation director and told them he would take it to the board"

"Rod tweeted in support of an inflammatory anti-Code-of-Conduct article"

Is this really all that there is to it?

Re: Effective immediately I am stepping down from the Nodejs TSC

#35

Post by geofft »

syshum wrote: post #18
fixermark wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

... or he committed the cardinal sin of questioning the Code of Conduct, and when challenged on it, responding with snark and condescension, demonstrating the need in the community for a Code of Conduct.

>>responding with snark and condescension Tell me it is not soo... Not snark and condescension.... Why that is the most terribleist thing ever.... it makes me sad that we has a society seem to be reject the concept of Free Speech in favor of speech codes and acceptable Speech with punishment for anyone that does not use the "correct words"

If I go to an interview for a Python developer position, and I say "I think Python is a stupid language and nobody should use it," and I don't get the job, it would be ridiculous for anyone to say that I got punished for not using the correct words.

This is the same thing. The Node.js TSC is the body that maintains and enforces the Code of Conduct. Maybe Node should have a CoC, maybe not, but so long as it has one, the body that enforces the CoC should actually intend to enforce the CoC. If they don't want it - get rid of it! Lots of projects don't have one. But if they want it, certainly only people who actually intend to enforce the CoC should be enforcing the CoC.

Re: Effective immediately I am stepping down from the Nodejs TSC

#36

Post by curtisblaine »

geofft wrote: post #16
curtisblaine wrote: post #12

So he dared to be in favour of anti-CoC article in one of his Twitter posts and thus unleashed the SJW brigade? What an heinous crime.

I think that's an uncharitable reading. It's one thing to be anti-CoC. It's another thing to be anti-CoC when you're on a committee whose job is to maintain and enforce the CoC. There's nothing dishonorable about saying "I don't think I agree with the goals of the job that I am doing, so I will let someone else do it," but he didn't do that. It's sort of like going to work for customs while being a strong believer in…

Wait, he's a member of the Technical Steering Committee, which is a group "of key Collaborators who have demonstrated both technical expertise critical to the ongoing maintenance and evolution of the project and a long term commitment to driving the project and community forward"[1], not "a committee whose job is to maintain and enforce the CoC", as you put it.

It's not inconceivable that an member of such a group could be thinking that "the best way of driving the project and community forward" is not having a CoC at all, or having one different than the current one (like the Linux one, for example).

[1](https://nodejs.org/en/foundation/tsc/)

Re: Effective immediately I am stepping down from the Nodejs TSC

#37

Post by peoplewindow »

jamescostian wrote: post #21
curtisblaine wrote: post #12

So he dared to be in favour of anti-CoC article in one of his Twitter posts and thus unleashed the SJW brigade? What an heinous crime.

Yes, and what some call daring, others call scary. One thing many people loved about Node was its openness to everyone. But when a leader of a group shows distaste for CoCs, one can see how that might mean the group's CoC may be threatened. Without CoCs, many people in the Node community wouldn't feel as safe. You may still feel just as safe, and that's great for you. But it's not very hard to understand why people a…

What's so special about the Node community then?

I've been doing open source work for 15+ years and I don't recall any of the projects I worked on having a CoC. Nor did it ever come up as an issue. I did see aggressive list moderation be abused to distort the technical path of a project though.

You talk about a "mass exodus". I find myself skeptical of this claim. If the NodeJS contributors are so dependent on a CoC then it seems like they went badly wrong somewhere. Somehow other projects thrive without one.

Re: Effective immediately I am stepping down from the Nodejs TSC

#38

Post by spootnik »

strictnein wrote: post #34

The unredacted details still feel like they're missing something: https://web.archive.org/web/20170821212745/https://github.co... "...Rod’s first action was to apologize to a contributor who had been repeatedly moderated. Rod did not discuss the issue with other members of the CTC/TSC first. The result undermined the moderation process as it was occurring" "Rod did not moderate himself when asked by another foundatio…

Seems to be it. The issue is he didn't fall in line with the SJW agenda of the TSC and was in support of free speech.

Re: Effective immediately I am stepping down from the Nodejs TSC

#39

Post by drostie »

rocqua wrote: post #24

Neither this post, nor the linked decision by the TSC make it possible for me to judge if this reaction is appropriate. Without details on how rvagg conducted himself, this could be anywhere from 'Social justice warriors biggest fuck up yet' to 'nepotism protects blatant asshole/racist/nazi/mysogonist'. This is all due to the following reasoning: [Note: the specific list of issues has been removed at the request of s…

It's not needless censorship even though it might not have been requested by Rod himself. The question before the TSC is "hey should we take action against Rod for shit like this: ________" and necessarily that blank is filled by a lot of stuff which makes Rod look like he's not a community player. Meanwhile the members of the TSC are able to contextualize this -- they are able to say "Well I have worked with this guy on this and that, I have seen more comments than just these, and I get to make a holistic evaluation of what's going on here."

Now if the original post goes public, it makes sense that the details be blanked as "not fair to Rod", since the rest of the world's eyes are going to look on just these things and might not have full context.

Re: Effective immediately I am stepping down from the Nodejs TSC

#40

Post by dragonwriter »

geofft wrote: post #16
curtisblaine wrote: post #12

So he dared to be in favour of anti-CoC article in one of his Twitter posts and thus unleashed the SJW brigade? What an heinous crime.

I think that's an uncharitable reading. It's one thing to be anti-CoC. It's another thing to be anti-CoC when you're on a committee whose job is to maintain and enforce the CoC. There's nothing dishonorable about saying "I don't think I agree with the goals of the job that I am doing, so I will let someone else do it," but he didn't do that. It's sort of like going to work for customs while being a strong believer in…

From the archived details it looks like the issue was less posting anti-CoC material (though that was part of it) than putting personal public advocacy outside of project processes ahead of engagement with project processes and representing the project more generally.

That's certainly something that a member of the community is generally free to do, but it's, in pretty much any organization regardless of domain or left-right position on the ideological spectrum, something that is viewed as inconsistent with membership in leadership committees except where that membership is an entitlement through, e.g., equity ownership.

EDIT: but it's also worth noting that the sanction votes in both proposed sanctions were 60/40 against sanctions, and the final outcome was to work to clarify expectations. (And clarifying expectations seems sensible since it is clear that there were sharp divisions within the community in the expectations here.)

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