Earlier quoted context omitted.
Oh how far we have strayed from the early Internet.
I was there and in most places people were way nicer than now.
But banter, irony and jokes were more accepted and not policed and politicized.
Ruby removed “Participants will be tolerant of opposing views” from its CoC
351–360 of 637 posts
Re: Ruby removed “Participants will be tolerant of opposing views” from its CoC
#352Almost more surprising is that this was removed: > When interpreting the words and actions of others, participants should always assume good intentions. In favor of this: > Participants should speak and act with good intentions, but understand that intent and impact are not equivalent. Also changed yesterday: > Behaviour which can be reasonably considered harassment will not be tolerated. became: > Behaviour which ca…
Regarding the "good intentions" change, the explanation in the linked twitter thread makes sense to me: in some contexts, assuming good intentions is a way of excusing bad behavior. It's hard to agree on the exact boundary between enabling a jerk and making an issue out of nothing. But the old "assume good intentions" policy does sound to me uncomfortably similar to "if you're offended it's your own fault". Which is…
That is misunderstanding of the principle. Of course you still need to use your head. For a community to be welcoming for people that aren't too extroverted, not fitting anyone on that mailing list really, your approach is very counter productive if you really want to empower voices that normally don't speak up.
It is also required for completely dry technical discussions. I am not sure I would want that in open source communities though, but that is certainly a preference.
Re: Ruby removed “Participants will be tolerant of opposing views” from its CoC
#353It's time for people to start badging projects with a new style of CoC, one line: "No woke ideology allowed." That's it. No explanation needed. Those who pretend they don't know what the rule means, or protest, are in violation. The radical left has been co-opting every organization they can get their hands on and kicking out the "non-believers" for years. It's time the handful of sane people that are left band toget…
I have been thinking of when I start a project to add a CODE_OF_CONDUCT.txt file which only contains "No code of conducts are allowed" making proposing a code of conduct a CoC violation. :D
Re: Ruby removed “Participants will be tolerant of opposing views” from its CoC
#354Earlier quoted context omitted.
One of my many misgivings about CoCs is their over-reliance on the unenforcable. This is an excellent example - because the original said exactly what needed to be said, but it wasn't being interpreted correctly. Instead of improving the wording, and saying something like "participants should always assume good intentions. However, intention does not make a person's actions immune from criticism, and while assuming g…
> to weaken the specificity and balance of the CoC. This is a feature, not a bug. When the rules are clear and specific, they can be enforced fairly. When they're vague and unclear, then the only consistent principle is that the people who "enforce" the "rules" can do whatever they want and you have no recourse or due process.
Rules can be enforced however fairly or not the rulers want. Better rules don't make for better rulers - at best, they make it more obvious when a ruler is not being fair.
Re: Ruby removed “Participants will be tolerant of opposing views” from its CoC
#355Earlier quoted context omitted.
They're meant to further empower accusers and reduce burden of proof and remove the need for critical thinking, empathy, and nuance. Accusations equal guilt.
Or maybe it just puts more responsibility on people to think "how could my intent be read?", "what impact might it have?" It's quite common to have someone express a personal opinion that they themselves don't interpret as harassment (e.g. because they don't belong to the group they're talking about, they see no issue with the way they talk or maybe they might be upset) only to be incredibly surprised and defensive w…
> Or maybe it just puts more responsibility on people to think "how could my intent be read?", "what impact might it have?"
How can you possibly read any possible minds. Even if you can predict the 'reasonable' person, outliers can take offence and you don't know what can offend them.
People can and do take offence at anything. This leaves two possible solutions.
1) Eventually fuck up.
2) Immediately leave the community and find greener, less insane pastures.
I've taken #2 in almost all cases, because I'm definitely going to screw up because I'm human.
Re: Ruby removed “Participants will be tolerant of opposing views” from its CoC
#356Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's a bit buried in the GH discussion, but someone else posted it here: "Maybe this has been written for women, having calculated their age ;)" If I were in charge of a community or mailing list, I would kick the person who wrote that off. But I simply don't see how (a) the existing rules didn't do enough to cover this, or (b) the changes will resolve those issues without causing other problems.
As I understand it, some people who want to make sexist jokes on the mailing list with impunity pointed to the language about tolerating opposing views to claim that their desire to belittle women on the mailing list must be tolerated. Maybe they should point to Karl Popper's paradox of tolerance: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradox_of_tolerance edit: evidently someone thinks this comment is worthy of a downvote. I…
This is not a good use of the paradox of tolerance. There was no threat of the ruby mailing lists being taken over by sexists using violence.
Popper was talking about groups like the Nazis coming to power. When overwhelming violence is near, you have to make a choice or else you’ll lose the capacity to make that choice. And even then, determining when overwhelming violence is near is extremely difficult and should be the absolute last resort.
It’s astounding how often this is linked with respect to online discussion.
Re: Ruby removed “Participants will be tolerant of opposing views” from its CoC
#357I realize CoCs were introduced to make certain supposedly marginalized groups more at home at conferences. But my personal experience/feeling is the complete reverse. I am a member of a minority as a person with a disability. In all the years I was interacting with the community, I haven't had a single issue with someone I couldn't handle myself. I never felt uneasy interacting with others. But the day I saw the first CoC being used in a community I was interacting with, I started to feel uneasy. I cant really say why, but I feel I dont want to interact with groups which need rules like these. I also stopped going to conferences. Gosh, I am even glad I didnt go to the DebConf where they invited Linus only to realize later that they are very unhappy with his speaking style. I would have felt too much shame for being a part of such a group of hyprocrits.
Re: Ruby removed “Participants will be tolerant of opposing views” from its CoC
#358Earlier quoted context omitted.
> to weaken the specificity and balance of the CoC. This is a feature, not a bug. When the rules are clear and specific, they can be enforced fairly. When they're vague and unclear, then the only consistent principle is that the people who "enforce" the "rules" can do whatever they want and you have no recourse or due process.
I don't know why you've been downvoted, but anyone that has seen how laws have been selectively enforced since whenever should be able to easily see how this is the case as well. It's the "everyone is guilty of breaking some law" principle, but applied to what is currently considered fashionable good behavior. It's a different kind of slippery slope and we'll know it when the wrong kind of people get into positions w…
Selective enforcement is exactly proof that the above comment is constructing an irrelevant problem. When the rulers don't like the rules, and there is no mechanism to force them, the rulers simply ignore the rules - they don't need to change the rules.
If you have bad rulers and no mechanism to change them, all giving them a perfect rule book to enforce will not produce better outcomes - they will selectively apply and interpret the rules as they want.
At best, a good set of rules will make it more obvious that the rulers are acting in bad faith. But the rules themselves can't compel the rulers - only other people can.
Re: Ruby removed “Participants will be tolerant of opposing views” from its CoC
#359Earlier quoted context omitted.
> intent is a big part of judging a wrong As well as being a bedrock principle of the law, it's also basic common sense. If I accidentally step on your toe, that's obviously different to me deliberately stamping on your toe in an intentional attempt to injure you. If you set out to deliberately injure your colleagues then this is OBVIOUSLY different from doing the same thing accidentally and should be treated differe…
People do believe it, because thinking that intent matters makes it impossible to defend their other position: that the most important thing is how the "offense" is received. If intent matters (as you say, anyone with half a brain knows it does), then if you receive my comment as being offensive, I am still right because I didn't mean to offend you. What they want is to make sure they can tell me I'm wrong anyway bec…
Offending someone doesn't make your position wrong, it may make you an asshole in their eyes, but it doesn't make you wrong.
Re: Ruby removed “Participants will be tolerant of opposing views” from its CoC
#360I realize CoCs were introduced to make certain supposedly marginalized groups more at home at conferences. But my personal experience/feeling is the complete reverse. I am a member of a minority as a person with a disability. In all the years I was interacting with the community, I haven't had a single issue with someone I couldn't handle myself. I never felt uneasy interacting with others. But the day I saw the firs…
The code of conduct is like HR. It’s there to protect the powerful, not to protect you.