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Heavy codes of conduct are unnecessary for open source projects

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Re: Heavy codes of conduct are unnecessary for open source projects

#21

Post by chrislo »

curtisblaine wrote: post #8
serial_dev wrote: post #5

The thing is that codes of conduct do not help honest actors “regulate” and deal with troublemakers. I used to organize meetups and I visited meetups organized by others who had code of conduct, and I just never understood what they were hoping to achieve with that. If someone behaves poorly, you can point at a document all you want, but it doesn’t help you deal that the problematic individual. A document that you pu…

[flagged]

What evidence do you have for that? I was involved in adopting a code of conduct for a local tech meetup and we did that because a couple of incidents that weren't handled very well left other people feeling unsafe and unwelcome. Having some guidelines in place reassured folks that we took those concerns seriously and gave us a framework to deal with unwanted behaviour.

Re: Heavy codes of conduct are unnecessary for open source projects

#22

Post by yakshaving_jgt »

squigz wrote: post #14

It seems some people need to re-read the title and article and consider the words "heavy", "bureaucratic" and the like No, CoCs - or rules in general - are not inherently bad. HN has some, which the moderators and the community enforce well, and it's generally one of the best platforms on the Internet for intelligent discussion. Yes, heavy CoCs can be weaponized and abused, if there is little or no trust between the…

> You think moderators need to establish a CoC to push their politics on people if they want? How does that even make sense? Why not just... do that, without a CoC?

I don't think this is what generally happens, or what people are wary of. I think group participants [sometimes] coerce moderators into establishing a CoC in order to have a tool to reach for in service of silencing voices they regard as "problematic".

Re: Heavy codes of conduct are unnecessary for open source projects

#23

Post by StopDisinfo910 »

CoC always appeared to me as a US issue which could pretty much be safely ignored by anyone living in the rest of the world. I generally dislike how they tend to be written as objective rules while actually being imperialist but most of them can safely be boiled down to act like a normal professional person.

The implied subtext of "avoid topic the US finds morally objectionable and when in doubt act like an American would" is what I dislike from a theorical point of view but the truth is, it doesn't really matter on a day to day basis.

So yes, CoC seems mostly harmless but also mostly useless. I tend to agree with the article point that if this is the case, keeping them short seems optimal.

Re: Heavy codes of conduct are unnecessary for open source projects

#25

Post by blueflow »

weird-eye-issue wrote: post #13
serial_dev wrote: post #5

The thing is that codes of conduct do not help honest actors “regulate” and deal with troublemakers. I used to organize meetups and I visited meetups organized by others who had code of conduct, and I just never understood what they were hoping to achieve with that. If someone behaves poorly, you can point at a document all you want, but it doesn’t help you deal that the problematic individual. A document that you pu…

> And we didn’t even talk about how it is being misused. People would point to these documents to silence and shut out people they don’t like and at the same time tolerate poor behavior that are clearly in violation of code of conduct by people they do like or whose politics or opinions they share. Has it occurred to you that's actually exactly why they exist? :)

I mean. Whenever a code of conduct was installed in a project i was passionate about, i could look up the contributor on twitter/fediverse and see that they are a zealot about their cause. Deflecting and uncompromising, very unagreeable. They would be the last persons to know how to make a community comfy.

Re: Heavy codes of conduct are unnecessary for open source projects

#28

Post by lowsong »

A big part of a CoC that this article, as most discussions on the topic, miss is that they provide a signal to new contributors from marginalized groups, who may have faced abuse or violence in other spaces, that this community will be safe for them to contribute to and - as many anti-CoC folk like to say - get on with the tech.

Not having a CoC doesn't mean a project is going to be unsafe to work in. But it means when another community member refuses to work with you, or belittles your work constantly, there is nothing to be done. For many, why take the risk. This means that projects are starving themselves of contributors because they don't create an environment that is safe.

Ruby's "CoC" is actually a fantastic example of why you need to spell it out too. "Participants are expected to be tolerant of opposing views." is often weaponized by abusers who like to paint basic requests like "please use my chosen name" as "not being tolerant".

Re: Heavy codes of conduct are unnecessary for open source projects

#29

Post by squigz »

yakshaving_jgt wrote: post #22
squigz wrote: post #14

It seems some people need to re-read the title and article and consider the words "heavy", "bureaucratic" and the like No, CoCs - or rules in general - are not inherently bad. HN has some, which the moderators and the community enforce well, and it's generally one of the best platforms on the Internet for intelligent discussion. Yes, heavy CoCs can be weaponized and abused, if there is little or no trust between the…

> You think moderators need to establish a CoC to push their politics on people if they want? How does that even make sense? Why not just... do that, without a CoC? I don't think this is what generally happens, or what people are wary of. I think group participants [sometimes] coerce moderators into establishing a CoC in order to have a tool to reach for in service of silencing voices they regard as "problematic".

> silencing voices they regard as "problematic".

I'm going to push past this extraordinarily bad faith framing. I'm going to assume you're referring to people who are made to feel uncomfortable or are harassed by other members of the community.

So if that community doesn't have a CoC, and those members talk to the moderators, and the moderators take action... is that coercion too? Is that the moderators or those members pushing their political views on the community? Should the moderators just not do anything?

Re: Heavy codes of conduct are unnecessary for open source projects

#30

Post by ricardobeat »

squigz wrote: post #14

It seems some people need to re-read the title and article and consider the words "heavy", "bureaucratic" and the like No, CoCs - or rules in general - are not inherently bad. HN has some, which the moderators and the community enforce well, and it's generally one of the best platforms on the Internet for intelligent discussion. Yes, heavy CoCs can be weaponized and abused, if there is little or no trust between the…

A written code of conduct can legitimize petty disputes based on interpretations of the text, even if the issue itself is something easily addressable like using the word “master” in a programming context. It can become a tool for manipulation (pushing someone out for “CoC violation” vs simply correcting the wording).
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