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Ruby removed “Participants will be tolerant of opposing views” from its CoC

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Re: Ruby removed “Participants will be tolerant of opposing views” from its CoC

#441
I am very sympathetic to this change. It probably doesn't go far enough to be honest.

This type of change is important because without it moderation is more difficult. What can feel like a masochistic job becomes near impossible where every decision is treated as though it violates soeone's free speech. In reality people who don't want to abide by the CoC are free to say whatever they want in spaces they manage.

Re: Ruby removed “Participants will be tolerant of opposing views” from its CoC

#442
post #438

- Behaviour which can be reasonably considered harassment will not be tolerated. + Behaviour which can be considered harassment against protected classes will not be tolerated. That change sure seems a lot like it's saying "we're now okay with harassment as long as the person you're harassing isn't a member of a protected class". Isn't that then adding abuse-enabling language, not removing it?

The person who submitted that particular PR is trolling (clear from their comments in the original #2690 thread) - this was satire.

But it got merged. That change is live on their official website now.

Re: Ruby removed “Participants will be tolerant of opposing views” from its CoC

#443
For some context, it looks like this might be the original message that started all of this mess... I'm not a Ruby person, but I thought it would be interesting to actually go back and follow the trail of what happened from the original mailing list messages (as opposed to what someone wrote on Twitter).

The original message:

>Another example - perhaps somebody could fix that (many errors have that source!)

>Date.today

>Date.today +1 # no error, but wrong result!

># Maybe this has been written for women, having calculated their age ;) [1]

Thankfully, it looks like many of the replies just ignored the comment. One helpfully added:

>(btw: please don't make sexist comments, it's discouraging to many people.) [2]

Others took it a bit further:

>No. Knock that bullshit off. [3]

>You're in the wrong here. Take the loss, own up to it, and do better next time. [4]

And somewhat predictably, things devolved from there...

> What's next? Don't make enterprise java jokes / comments, it's discouraging to many people. [5]

[1] http://blade.nagaokaut.ac.jp/cgi-bin/scat.rb/ruby/ruby-talk/...

[2] http://blade.nagaokaut.ac.jp/cgi-bin/scat.rb/ruby/ruby-talk/...

[3] http://blade.nagaokaut.ac.jp/cgi-bin/scat.rb/ruby/ruby-talk/...

[4] http://blade.nagaokaut.ac.jp/cgi-bin/scat.rb/ruby/ruby-talk/...

[5] http://blade.nagaokaut.ac.jp/cgi-bin/scat.rb/ruby/ruby-talk/...

Re: Ruby removed “Participants will be tolerant of opposing views” from its CoC

#444

Almost 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…

"Protected class" means stuff like race, sex or veteran status. So if you harass a random conference-goer at a Ruby-focused event, that cannot be addressed under the CoC because you haven't evidenced harassment towards a protected class as a whole (e.g. all veterans)? How does that even make sense?

Interesting, that "Age (over 40)" are cited as "Protected class". So people over 40, which feel harassed by many of these "new rules" can actually do something about it?

Re: Ruby removed “Participants will be tolerant of opposing views” from its CoC

#445
post #49

Earlier 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…

Reasonable people believe that they have a duty to be careful about how they communicate, and have a duty to consider others intent.

Re: Ruby removed “Participants will be tolerant of opposing views” from its CoC

#446

The change indicated in the title[1] was made on foot of trolling by the user @hmdne It's really a remarkable failure of communication. It doesn't appear anyone read what he was saying carefully. They just looked at the first two lines of his proposal and assumed they understood his intent. And then when encouraged he actually made the change. And they actually merged it. It's amazing that people who are apparently p…

That is some golden level trolling and speaks significantly to the quality of the process which enabled these updates.

Re: Ruby removed “Participants will be tolerant of opposing views” from its CoC

#447
Logically, a double edged sword. What an "opposing view" is is relative. The people who put this in place are logically opening the door to people being intolerant to their views, which is likely not the intended effect.

But, of course, this isn't a matter of logic and the CoC is obviously not written to account for everyone's views. It is written to protect the views of the writers of the CoC.

This isn't necessarily a bad thing. No one hires declared Nazis at universities (Maoists and other communist ilk, yes), and neutrality is not a thing. It's a question of whether those writing the CoC are correct and coherent. Are they feigning universal tolerance while imposing a regime of intolerance?

Re: Ruby removed “Participants will be tolerant of opposing views” from its CoC

#448

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Having a position of always assuming good intentions can be gamed by people with bad intentions.

It also is an issue for all others. FX I don’t know if it is appropriate to say “you guys” to a mixed crowd anymore, but if I hadn’t seen that some people get upset about that I wouldn’t think twice about it and just emulated American movies. Buffy isn’t exactly sexist and she says it often and to a mixed crowd.

If you're in a mixed crowd that cares how you say "you guys" you should probably rethink whether you want to associate with these people.

Re: Ruby removed “Participants will be tolerant of opposing views” from its CoC

#449

Please tell me that this Code of Conducts are all jokes? I've developed a fragile and basic rule which I try to follow: Don't be an asshole. I fail sometimes following that rule and I don't deny it. I struggle to become better but keep going. Of course you could extend this by "Help others, when appropriate", "Be nice to each other", "Use common sense", "Pardon others", "Don't be a d***", "Don't be a b*****" but that…

>I've developed a fragile and basic rule which I try to follow: Don't be an asshole.

Give yourself some credit. There's a lot of precedence for this rule. One of the original versions of it goes something like:

"So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you..."

Re: Ruby removed “Participants will be tolerant of opposing views” from its CoC

#450
post #429
post #406

I wish we responded to situations more proportionally. In this case, someone made a joke about women not liking to reveal their true age as they get older. It's a boring cliched joke. Something I've heard too many times in my life (and, most often from women). Is it sexist? I can see the argument. Is it professional to make such a joke on a ruby mailing list? I don't know, perhaps not. Does it warrant responses like…

> Seems a little ironic to use unprofessional language in this situation. It's not ironic. Forceful language (and rather tame still) is not just as bad as a 'joke'. The offence was not at the unprofessionalism of the joke, but at the contents of the joke. That is what fuelled a discussion. Removing the line from the CoC also was not a response to the joke. It was a response to the ensuing discussion about the joke. T…

> Removing the line from the CoC also was not a response to the joke. It was a response to the ensuing discussion about the joke.

> Talking about proportionality as if the change was brought because of the joke is as questioning the proportionality of WW I to the death of archduke Franz Ferdinand.

I first thought your response was a joke, but maybe you actually mean that, put some emojis next time to show if you are joking

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