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Announcing the GNU Kind Communication Guidelines

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Re: Announcing the GNU Kind Communication Guidelines

#81

Post by JoeAltmaier »

whatshisface wrote: post #74
joshuamorton wrote: post #60

So, I read through the list of guidelines, and while I have some minor quibbles with them, overall they seem fine and reasonable. But what happens if someone refuses to be kind? What happens if that person is a major contributor? What would happen if, in some strange alternate reality, Linux was a GNU project, and Linus-of-2012 said he'd really rather not care about all this politeness nonsense, and would prefer to c…

How much damage have Linus's snippy emails really caused, in light of how they have benefited us? I and many other people like reading them because they are fun, so you have to take that in to account. Different people like different things, and that principle extends to writing styles and personalities. Indeed, if you really want to have diversity you should have some emails that I like to read in addition to having…

I think that whole issue was, while it may be amusing to watch the drama unfold, that valuable contributors were being disaffected. No, its not about how entertaining the email chain reads. Its about getting work done?

And it's disingenuous to describe the vicious attacks as 'snippy' and 'glib'.

Re: Announcing the GNU Kind Communication Guidelines

#82

Post by ubernostrum »

folknor wrote: post #76
ubernostrum wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your uncharitable interpretation of the tweet you linked cannot be read as accidental.

Yes it can, when you realise the fact that I linked to it, and that anyone who cares enough about the subject can investigate and apparently instantly realise that my face-value interpretation of the tweet was entirely mistaken. Then it should be obvious that it was an accident. If not, I would not have linked a source that instantly disproves what I said.

You state that you learned of it from someone who "linked to an article that had a screenshot of it". The only way you could have not arrived at the correct interpretation is if you also took at face value misinformation presented to you in the surrounding context. Which in turn suggests you spend time uncritically accepting such misinformation.

You may consider that an accident. I do not.

Re: Announcing the GNU Kind Communication Guidelines

#84

Post by beaconstudios »

marijn wrote: post #13

While it sounds very reasonable, friendly, and non-authoritarian, a big problem with an approach like this, without real teeth or rigidity, is that it is very easy to harass people out of a community while staying within its constraints, and provides very little recourse for those being harassed (who often are not in a position of power) to put on pressure for getting something done about it. The approach taken large…

I'm inclined to believe that the normative case for these kinds of documents is not intentional harassment, but simple miscommunication. Starting with encouraging introspection and moving through mediation before getting to outright banning makes sense. Moving straight to ejection for comments that could easily not be intentionally abusive, is just giving ultimate authority to anyone who takes offence. Better to put both sides of a dispute on neutral ground, and allow community leaders (or the community at large) to sort out the disagreement. But a key step before that should be to encourage people to consider how their words and actions could be interpreted to hopefully avoid offending in the first place.

Re: Announcing the GNU Kind Communication Guidelines

#85

Post by Spivak »

civodul wrote: post #28

As co-maintainer of GNU Guix, I want to point out that the views expressed in Richard Stallman's message are his and not those of the Guix maintainers. In particular, by writing that codes of conduct are "punitive spirit", RMS shows a misunderstanding of how these texts came into existence. More importantly, by writing that he disagrees with "making diversity a goal", RMS seems to deny the role we free software peopl…

Speaking counter to not only RMS but also the tide of popular opinion not only on HN but the internet at large I'm sure takes a lot of courage -- and I just want to say thank you.

Re: Announcing the GNU Kind Communication Guidelines

#86

Post by [deleted] »

dang wrote: post #52
fossdev wrote: post #39

Diversity as a goal is fundamentally flawed. It is what leads to policies like "affirmative action" which are in themselves simply a form of reverse discrimination.

Please don't take HN threads on generic flamewar tangents. They are all the same and resolve nothing. We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18275156 .

[deleted]

Re: Announcing the GNU Kind Communication Guidelines

#87

Post by KirinDave »

phoe-krk wrote: post #5

A code of conduct states rules, with punishments for anyone that violates them. It is the heavy-handed way of teaching people to behave differently, and since it only comes into action when people do something against the rules, it doesn't try to teach people to do better than what the rules require. To be sure, the appointed maintainer(s) of a GNU package can, if necessary, tell a contributor to go away; but we do n…

> That is the paragraph that captures the essence of the CoC issues for me. A CoC seems to be used as a weapon for killing those that do not abide by its rules, not as a tool for teaching each other to be awesome to each other.

Can I ask an honest question? Do you really think that men advocating for molestation of women, or open racists, are just... you know... undereducated and waiting for you as a thought-savior to come and explain to them what's objectionable about their thinking? Do you think that Ts'o just needed you to step in and explain how domestic sexual abuse is rape and that he's just being insufficiently awesome[0]?

I'm all for assuming positive intent, but at some point this game becomes patronizing, even infantilizing. It seems bizarre to propose Linux's CoC or GNU's is the place to go educating people that rape apology is bad.

I don't think it's bad that Stallman decided to go this route (even if I disagree with some of the logic he expressed). To be honest, I don't think the GNU org actually has that much sway or control over individual projects, so guidelines for successful contribution are probably an appropriate measure for them.

But Projects can and in my opinion should quantify what constitutes acceptable behavior from their contributors. This is not an unfair or unreasonable thing for a project to do. It's bizarre to me that people here constantly suggest that it's somehow unfair to bar a developer from participating. This is about the most anti-free-speech, anti-individual-autonomy stance one can propose in the world of software. It's a statement that says the production of value (often not for the community, but at the behest of corporate funding) outweighs the individual's rights to free association. It suggests that reprehensible people with reprehensible views can simply use economic value or unique education to force themselves on communities, and those communities should not be able to choose for themselves because the value of these things should be self-evident. It's completely nonsensical.

[0]: http://www.codon.org.uk/~mjg59/ted_mail/0037.html

Re: Announcing the GNU Kind Communication Guidelines

#88

Post by pjc50 »

whatshisface wrote: post #74
joshuamorton wrote: post #60

So, I read through the list of guidelines, and while I have some minor quibbles with them, overall they seem fine and reasonable. But what happens if someone refuses to be kind? What happens if that person is a major contributor? What would happen if, in some strange alternate reality, Linux was a GNU project, and Linus-of-2012 said he'd really rather not care about all this politeness nonsense, and would prefer to c…

How much damage have Linus's snippy emails really caused, in light of how they have benefited us? I and many other people like reading them because they are fun, so you have to take that in to account. Different people like different things, and that principle extends to writing styles and personalities. Indeed, if you really want to have diversity you should have some emails that I like to read in addition to having…

It's not about whether you "like" to read them or not, it's about whether the people they're directed at (and the audience) read them and decide to withdraw from the project (or never join it).

Re: Announcing the GNU Kind Communication Guidelines

#89

Post by SolaceQuantum »

binaryapparatus wrote: post #31

Being politically correct vs getting the job done, I'll always choose getting the job done. There is plenty or role playing projects where your feeling matter more than your skills. In last couple of jobs I am always asking about company policy, if they start piling about diversity and getting everybody heard and how everybody's feelings are most important thing, I don't want to work there. Earn your place with your…

> Being politically correct vs getting the job done, I'll always choose getting the job done.

I am absolutely baffled at the idea that there is ever a situation where getting the job done requires a choice to be politically incorrect as implied here. Do you have an example of the phenomenon you're discussing?

Re: Announcing the GNU Kind Communication Guidelines

#90

Post by JulianMorrison »

When people are arguing for "diversity" what they are meaning, generally, is "there is already an enormous thumb on the scales, this can be shown empirically by outcomes". So to the extent Stallman's intent is to take the thumb off the scales and make everyone welcome, it is very reasonable.

That said, I think he's wrong to devalue quota type approaches, because in some circumstances, particularly institutional ones in business and government, those are a very effective way to force a noncompliant culture to take its thumb off the scales.

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