[OSGeo-Discuss] Changes (and proposed changes) regarding the Code of Conduct

Tue Dec 11 17:32:36 PST 2018

Rather than guilty until proven innocent, I think the covenant proposes 
a neutral and evidence-based approach. Mandating good faith as a 
starting point unfortunately enables bullies who provoke a response and 
then hide behind "X can't take a joke" or other minimisation to further 
harm their victim. I have not seen this in OSGeo but I have seen it in 
several cases elsewhere and I hope we will all be sufficiently alert to 
prevent it. I think that a proportionate and sensitive response will 
encourage consideration of the feelings of others without harming our 
collegial atmosphere.

As another cross-cultural example, several of our members have given 
names that are masculine in Italian but feminine in English, resulting 
in their occasional misgendering on mailing lists and pull requests. 
While I found this amusing and assumed that it was unintentional, I also 
knew that some might find such misgendering insulting or hurtful and in 
any case it was not a good precedent, so I took the time to gently point 
out the mistake in private (IIRC). In each case, the mistake was not 
repeated. We can all take little actions that contribute to a welcoming 
environment.

Kind regards,
Ben.

On 11/12/2018 13:44, Jonathan Moules wrote:
> Hi Maria,
> 
> Just a thought, but I'm not sure getting rid of the assumption of good 
> faith is a good idea. To do so would be basically assuming people are 
> guilty until proven innocent which runs counter to how these things 
> should work.
> 
> To use a personal anecdote, many years ago I had a black flatmate who I 
> was joking around with and I made a comment that it turns out is a 
> negative racial epithet. Being young and unworldly, I didn't know that 
> at the time and certainly didn't mean it in that context, it also has a 
> perfectly innocent context - the only one I'd ever been exposed to - 
> which is how I was using it.
> 
> Now, reading your thebias.com link, I can see that the author there 
> would suggest I be pilloried for what was an honest mistake. They'd say 
> I was being "careless" or "ignorant" and stepping on their toes. But I 
> don't think either is fair because it's not reasonable to expect people 
> to know everything that could offend everyone, especially somewhere as 
> multicultural as the internet.
> 
> For example, consider this symbol: 👍a simple thumbs-up emoticon that's 
> commonly used to signify "it's all good" and "thanks". Well, it turns 
> out that it's "an obscene insult" in some cultures! I didn't know that 
> until a few seconds ago when I went searching for a simple example.
> 
> I have learnt over the years from experiences in both directions that 
> it's best to always assume good faith if possible. Humans may be the 
> species with the most complex communication on the planet, but that 
> doesn't mean we don't fail often.
> 
> @Ben - Thanks for sharing World Human Rights day. I'm a long time fan of 
> the UNDHR!
> 
> Cheers,
> Jonathan
> 
> 
> On 2018-12-09 12:49, María Arias de Reyna wrote:
>> Dear OSGeo community,
>>
>> As you may already know, I have been working for the last months in 
>> improving our community procedures[1] to make it a safer space. Recent 
>> events in the community have shown that we have a lot of work ahead.
>>
>> We all, as OSGeo, must remove the recent bullying and campaigning 
>> mentality that is unfortunately gradually become a part of our 
>> culture. Disclosing private data or hinting threats is not helpful and 
>> can only make our community less comfortable for everyone. We will 
>> work on improving actions on harmful behavior.
>>
>> This has been a slow task, but there are some actions taking place:
>>
>> CoC committee members have become inactive. I volunteered to pick up 
>> the task and lead a new CoC committee. Right now I am the only CoC 
>> member, but I am looking for more volunteers. If only, to make sure 
>> that if I am involved in any CoC incident, someone else can take care 
>> of it properly as mediator.
>>
>> I want to change also the way incidents and violations of the CoC are 
>> reported. I noticed there are reports being done on person and on 
>> private email, but never through the official channels (which right 
>> now is a mailing list).To improve this, I will ask the SAC to replace 
>> the mailing list with an alias and a form on the website. Also, there 
>> will be a public list of who receives those emails so people reporting 
>> incidents will have a clear understanding of who is receiving the 
>> information and decide to contact privately only a subset of the team. 
>> Replacing the mailing list by an alias that sends the data directly to 
>> the inbox of the CoC team is important, as sometimes incidents are not 
>> reported just because the person reporting is scared to leave a trace 
>> of the report or is not sure who will be reading the report.
>>
>> Another action I am going to propose is a change on the CoC itself. 
>> Our community has grown a lot both in diversity and in numbers, and we 
>> need a strict code of conduct that makes sure marginalized or harrased 
>> people is always covered by it. We can't rely anymore on just common 
>> sense and good faith.
>>
>> Once the new board is settled, I am going to propose to change the 
>> current CoC for another like the Contributor Covenant[2]. As it is a 
>> CoC shared by many communities, this has the advantage of receiving 
>> the upgrades and experience from other communities. As you can see, it 
>> fixes some of the bugs from our CoC, like the assuming good intent and 
>> good faith[3] part that made the current CoC useless on most cases. I 
>> will propose to add some foreword to adapt to specifities for our 
>> community, but in my opinion, the latest version of the Contributor 
>> Covenant is easy to read, simple, and cover most of what we need. My 
>> hope is that this new CoC can be adapted to all OSGeo Projects and 
>> Events that don't already have a CoC, so we have full OSGeo universe 
>> covered by default.
>>
>> I hope this actions will prove useful in the medium term and we don't 
>> have to see more members leaving the community. We should remember to 
>> be empathic and kind. We are all seeking the same goals and we should 
>> encourage cooperation, not hinder each other. I know that developer 
>> communities are very used to these bad behaviours, but I'm confident 
>> we can grow better.
>>
>> Have a nice day!
>> María.
>>
>>
>> [1] https://lists.osgeo.org/pipermail/board/2018-August/011640.html
>> [2] https://www.contributor-covenant.org/
>> [3] 
>> https://thebias.com/2017/09/26/how-good-intent-undermines-diversity-and-inclusion/ 
>>
>>
>>
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> 
> 
> 
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-- 
Ben Caradoc-Davies <ben at transient.nz>
Director
Transient Software Limited <https://transient.nz/>
New Zealand