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New FreeBSD Code of Conduct

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Re: New FreeBSD Code of Conduct

#81

Post by youdontknowtho »

pvg wrote: post #58
Yver wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The benefits of that kind of CoC remain to be proven. Meanwhile, I note that HN's moderating guidelines do not mention sex, gender, religion, food choices, or most of what FreeBSD's new CoC describes. HN's moderating guidelines are about content whereas FreeBSD's new Code of Conduct codifies human behaviour, as the name would imply. They are different things.

I note that HN's moderating guidelines do not mention sex, gender, religion, food choices, or most of what FreeBSD's new CoC describes. You might also note that HN regularly fills up with pages upon pages of sexist (more rarely, racist) tripe. Which might be ok for HN but the people who participate in the FreeBSD project have decided it's not ok for their thing.

yeah, ive been wondering if it was just me or if comments were starting to seem more reactionary?

Re: New FreeBSD Code of Conduct

#82

Post by jauer »

Caveman_Coder wrote: post #72

I wonder why tech communities need their CoC... I'm a member of a local HAM radio group and we don't have any CoC and we don't have any issues at all. The male/female makeup is about 70/30 and there are people of various political/religious viewpoints, but I haven't once seen any issues over these differences. I've seen leftists amicably talk and work with conservatives because when we meet as a group it is all about…

local HAM radio group.

Perhaps being local creates more social cohesion.

I've seen plenty of these issues in online ham groups, including political and religious sniping.

Re: New FreeBSD Code of Conduct

#84

Post by ygaf »

louiz wrote: post #77
HumanDrivenDev wrote: post #66

I wonder how short you could make a code of conduct. Here's my attempt: 1. No politics 2. No religion 3. Don't be a cunt

Your rule 3 would probably create a looooot of drama. So, attempt failed.

I'm writing a CoCoC before he attempts another CoC.

Re: New FreeBSD Code of Conduct

#85

Post by temprature »

coldtea wrote: post #52
rayiner wrote: post #2

This is great: simple and easy to understand. For everyone feigning confusion about modern professional behavioral norms, just memorize this list.

Or "anyone not familiar with the fashionable norms du jour, here's a list of potential thought crimes as derived by one country's culture (and its internal conflicts, cultural politics, and religious and post-religious baggage) and imposed on supposedly global communities".

In what country is it acceptable to not treat others with basic courtesy and respect? Which is really all the list is asking for.

Re: New FreeBSD Code of Conduct

#86

Post by xyzzyz »

soyiuz wrote: post #73

I am always surprised at the backlash against such codes of conduct. One can point to numerous cases of harassment, abuse, and inequality in the tech community. Who is harmed by a stronger CoC? Let's discuss an example where CoC led to a negative outcome for some group.

What’s the purpose of a Code of Conduct? If someone is abusive and harassing others, you can eject them without having some Code of Conduct giving the community permission to do so, and if you lack clout to eject someone for actual abuse and harrasment, how will CoC help you? Do you think that without CoC, people in the community believe that harrasment and abuse is OK, and it’s only CoC that will make them change their minds?

Instituting the CoC is a power play. It allows you to increase your power and influence by pushing the boundaries of what counts as harrasment much further than it would otherwise be understood, for very simple reason — for most people, fighting against CoC is not the hill they want to die on, as nobody wants to be seen as defender of abuse and harrasment.

It is similar to child pornography legislation — you can go to jail for hand drawn pictures of specialized children, which is pretty stupid if you think about it, but most people don’t care: they aren’t pedophiles and so they aren’t interested in sexualized content featuring children, and the personal gain of feeling good about defending individual freedom and liberty is not worth the status loss from, you know, defending actual pedophiles.

With CoC it is similar — you are expanding your sphere of power and influence, and everyone opposed is just dirty defender of abuse and harrasment, and so basically a harraser herself, and thus we need to eject her for the good of the community.

Re: New FreeBSD Code of Conduct

#87

Post by Caveman_Coder »

soyiuz wrote: post #76
Caveman_Coder wrote: post #72

I wonder why tech communities need their CoC... I'm a member of a local HAM radio group and we don't have any CoC and we don't have any issues at all. The male/female makeup is about 70/30 and there are people of various political/religious viewpoints, but I haven't once seen any issues over these differences. I've seen leftists amicably talk and work with conservatives because when we meet as a group it is all about…

CoCs are useful for coordination among large, non-local, diverse communities. Have you considered that instead of "purposefully want[ing] to stir up discord" for funding the rules are meant to reduce the incidence of actual harassment/abuse? Or to promote inclusivity? How does an articulation of values "stir up discord?" I can point you to numerous examples of harassment and inequity in the tech community. Can you po…

> "Can you point me to an example of "discord" brought about by better rules of conduct? Or to this funding that you mention?"

Only my wife's anecdotal experience...she was a full-time software developer and the companies she worked for routinely tried to use her as an example in their "we support women in tech" PR. She hated it and said it felt degrading. Also, there were various "women in tech" groups that reached out to her, based on some of her open source work, for conference speaking engagements/panels/writing/etc, and they were pushy about it. When she was showing the groups to me, they were all operating off of donations from various Fortune 500 companies. The "discord" is that a lot of these "women in tech" groups, advocated in some cases by women who aren't even doing anything tech related, castigated my wife, on two various instances, for not wanting to participate. My wife didn't want to be a pawn for some corporate PR or for some "women in tech" group...she just wanted to engineer things in peace.

Re: New FreeBSD Code of Conduct

#88

Post by jacobian »

Caveman_Coder wrote: post #72

I wonder why tech communities need their CoC... I'm a member of a local HAM radio group and we don't have any CoC and we don't have any issues at all. The male/female makeup is about 70/30 and there are people of various political/religious viewpoints, but I haven't once seen any issues over these differences. I've seen leftists amicably talk and work with conservatives because when we meet as a group it is all about…

I assume you have some standards of behavior, though, right? If a member of your group, say, punched another member, you’d probably kick him out, right?

If so: you have a code of conduct, you just don’t have a _written_ code of conduct. You’re relying on the relative homogeneity and shared context of the group to know and follow the unwritten rules.

This tends to work ok for smaller more homogenous groups with shared social values. But unwritten rules fail for people on the margins, and falls apart at scale.

Re: New FreeBSD Code of Conduct

#89

Post by soyiuz »

malvosenior wrote: post #42

> Comments that reinforce systemic oppression related to gender, gender identity and expression, sexual orientation, disability, mental illness, neurodiversity, physical appearance, body size, age, race, or religion. Harassment should be harassment, no? Does it matter if the perpetrator is "reinforcing systemic oppression" or just being obnoxious? Why put this clause in here? Will it be enforced when someone says "ki…

When "killing all men" type of behavior becomes problematic you will have a point. The problem has been that some people don't understand what "being obnoxious" is and need it spelled out for them. Because men have not been historically a target of oppression, the explanation now has the language that it does, using actual examples / lines of harassment.

Re: New FreeBSD Code of Conduct

#90

Post by Caveman_Coder »

jacobian wrote: post #88
Caveman_Coder wrote: post #72

I wonder why tech communities need their CoC... I'm a member of a local HAM radio group and we don't have any CoC and we don't have any issues at all. The male/female makeup is about 70/30 and there are people of various political/religious viewpoints, but I haven't once seen any issues over these differences. I've seen leftists amicably talk and work with conservatives because when we meet as a group it is all about…

I assume you have some standards of behavior, though, right? If a member of your group, say, punched another member, you’d probably kick him out, right? If so: you have a code of conduct, you just don’t have a _written_ code of conduct. You’re relying on the relative homogeneity and shared context of the group to know and follow the unwritten rules. This tends to work ok for smaller more homogenous groups with shared…

I think that is a fair point. Our group is relatively homogeneous in our interest in HAM radio (and there aren't that many of us), so when we find others that share the same interest, perhaps we're more likely to overlook any political/religious/racial differences...
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