On 29 July 2018 at 18:27, Chris Keating <chriskeatingwiki(a)gmail.com> wrote: I'm one of the people who commented, early on, on that original thread; and I don't believe that describes my post. I did note that there was prima face evidence that a community member who had a disability (my word for it; not theirs) appeared to have been discriminated against, at least in part, due to the effects of that disability. I would expect or "safe space" policy to ensure that this did not happen. I have not seen a single response, to date, that has addressed this point; either specifically or in general. -- Andy Mabbett @pigsonthewing http://pigsonthewing.org.uk

Hello all, In response to this I wrote something in defence of friendly space policies, as I think we are looking at them the wrong way. It's far from complete but just a few ideas. TL:DR: Safe space policies are important, but being both less defensive, and less judgemental about infractions, is good , and the only way we learn. https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Battleofalma/What_did_I_do_wrong Thanks S On 15 August 2018 at 04:39, Romaine Wiki &lt;romaine.wiki(a)gmail.com&gt; wrote: -- *Stuart Prior* *Project Coordinator* *Wikimedia UK* +44 20 372 0769 +44 7879 015 385 (text me otherwise I might screen the call) Wikimedia UK is the national chapter for the global Wikimedia open knowledge movement. We rely on donations from individuals to support our work to make knowledge open for all. Have you considered supporting Wikimedia? https://donate.wikimedia.org.uk Wikimedia UK is a Company Limited by Guarantee registered in England and Wales, Registered No. 6741827. Registered Charity No.1144513. Registered Office Ground Floor, Europoint, 5 - 11 Lavington Street, London SE1 0NZ <https://maps.google.com/?q=5+-+11+Lavington+Street,+London+SE1+0NZ&entry=gmail&source=g> . Wikimedia UK is the UK chapter of a global Wikimedia movement. The Wikimedia projects are run by the Wikimedia Foundation (who operate Wikipedia, amongst other projects). *Wikimedia UK is an independent non-profit charity with no legal control over Wikipedia nor responsibility for its contents.*

I disagree that there is no use for a policy at all. Sure, there are laws, but I would prefer not to have to use them - that we can avoid misbehavior in the first place. Having a good and consistent policy helps Wikipedians navigate. Don't (just) define what is forbidden, but (also) define what is 'good behavior'. For some people this is obvious, but there are also community members that find comfort in knowing what is a safe guideline to follow. There are also community members that will find comfort in knowing that they can expect certain behavior from their colleagues, no matter the country the event happens to be organized in. I do agree however, that arbitrariness is not a good outcome. If there is even the impression that there is arbitrariness, the value of the policy is tainted. This is why I'm asking to review the policy - not because I disagree with the core principles, but because I don't like how it plays out - at the very least in the perception. But in this, I'm starting to repeat myself. Best, Lodewijk On Sun, Jul 29, 2018 at 11:03 PM DaB. &lt;wp(a)dabpunkt.eu&gt; wrote:

Hello John. Am 29.07.2018 um 23:40 schrieb John Hendrik Weitzmann: I was at 2 Wikimanias, 5 WikiCons, several workshops and meetings, and nearly 2 dozen of WMDE-chapter-meeting – and only the very least of them had a written down policy: And we managed to survive too. Even better, because we had no unneeded arguments about a policy. When I go to a meeting of Wikipedians I want to talk with people. I don’t want to worry about if my current behavior is in line with the current policy. I will respect the other people around me, I will try to not make them uncomfortable, and if there is a problem (for example: being too loud) I expect that somebody will talk to me, and I’m sure that there will be a solution. I don’t need a list of norms that somebody defined who may had a different cultural background – or even worse: the intersecting set of what is ok in all cultures (that may/will be the empty set). Good night. DaB. -- Benutzerseite: [[:w:de:User:DaB.]] PGP: 0x7CD1E35FD2A3A158 (pka funktioniert)

I have no personal knowledge of the recent events at Wikimania, and I will speak about only the general principles involved. Please provide evidence that backs up that point. I have repeatedly seen similar assertions made by WMF staff with no data or analysis to support it. I wholeheartedly disagree. I don't trust judges to put people in jail simply because they happen to be judges. I trust judges to put people in jail after the publication of convincing evidence and reasoning to support their intended course of action. The standard of evidence required to remove someone from office, or remove them from an event, can be lower than the standard required to put someone in jail, but I still want mostly transparent due process to happen so that: 1. people who allege that misconduct has taken place have significant visibility into how their complaints are handled and thus, hopefully, can have confidence that the accusations are investigated in a responsible manner instead of being carelessly dismissed, and 2. people are not victimized with clearly false or poorly supported accusations that the authorities recklessly use as a basis for issuing sanctions instead of conducting a responsible investigation. Pine ( https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Pine )

Probably I am saying the same and this means to don’t use categories in this discussion. Is not it clear? Kind regards -- Ilario Valdelli Wikimedia CH Verein zur Förderung Freien Wissens Association pour l’avancement des connaissances libre Associazione per il sostegno alla conoscenza libera Switzerland - 8008 Zürich Wikipedia: Ilario Skype: valdelli Tel: +41764821371 http://www.wikimedia.ch From: Philip Kopetzky Sent: 30 July 2018 09:01 To: Wikimania general list (open subscription) Subject: Re: [Wikimania-l] Friendly Space Policy (was: Sad news) Guys, can you please take any discussion among you white males to Wikimedia-l if you still feel the need to discuss this amongst you? You can't force a public debate, especially wheb Asaf and Lilli have already stated the obvious.  On Mon, 30 Jul 2018, 08:39 Ilario Valdelli, &lt;ilario.valdelli(a)wikimedia.ch&gt; wrote: Hi all, I comment here because this reply is important and I agree with it but I would also stress that 75% of the women being harassed probably are in position where someone takes an advantage of his position to create around these women a forced silence and the possibility of blackmail. But it’s not the case that started this thread.   To use correctly the statistics, the numbers must be understood correctly because the Fundamental Rights Agency is reporting about “women in qualified professions or top management” and it means in an uncomfortable position.   In all this discussion what strikes me is the exaggerated reaction of both parties.   The use of the safe space policy is good and is welcome but this policy has a value where it’s applied in a correct way and there is not an exaggerated use.   And yes, “exaggeration” is what I would stress now in the wikiverse.   I already said that probably it would have been sufficient to ask “kindly” to don’t be touched and to use an escalation or to use the safe space policy when this behavior would have been recurrent and constant after this first warning.   I suggest to don’t exaggerate because if we would solve a discrimination introducing discrimination, or we would look at this case as an example of inappropriate behavior on women probably we have to look to the history of the wolf and the lamb of Esopo.   The principle of the safe space policy is good and it has been created mainly to protect the freedom of opinion, but I suggest to take care to don’t introduce the difference of gender or of race or of religion etc. Because every time we gives an advantage or a disadvantage to someone using these categories, there is always a part which is discriminated.   Kind regards   -- Ilario Valdelli Wikimedia CH Verein zur Förderung Freien Wissens Association pour l’avancement des connaissances libre Associazione per il sostegno alla conoscenza libera Switzerland - 8008 Zürich Wikipedia: Ilario Skype: valdelli Tel: +41764821371 http://www.wikimedia.ch   From: Lilli Iliev Sent: 29 July 2018 19:05 To: wikimania-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org Subject: [Wikimania-l] Friendly Space Policy (was: Sad news)   Hi all,   I decided to contribute to this thread, however not in order to elaborate on my personal opinion on this specific case. This would be inappropriate, as we do not have sufficient information about it and also out of respect for the people involved.   Instead, I want to comment, because I feel strongly about the consequences this discussion may have - not only on the perception of the friendly space policy and its effectiveness, but also on people who may need to refer to the policy in the future.   This past Wikimania was very much about the importance of representing all people in our movement and about finding ways for them to have a voice, to be heard – and to feel safe to contribute and participate.   One reliable way to silence people when they experience harassment as well as keeping others from speaking out, is to have them experience how other, non-involved people, would immediately have an opinion on what happened and judge the case or the person in question. This is what has happened here. It is furthermore, absolutely out of proportion to weigh ones personal irritation about some members being potentially more aware and sensitive of this topic, against a context in which harassment and violence is not the exception, but everyday reality.   Policies and measures like codes of conduct etc. exist for a reason. Invisible to many, harassment does happen, it happens a lot, it happens also amongst communities with great, humanitarian goals. In the world most of us live in, offensive or invasive behavior has no tangible consequences for those who commit it, but severe effects on those who experience it. According to the Fundamental Rights Agency, 75% of women in qualified professions or top management jobs have been sexually harassed[1]. UN Women has confirmed that there is a big problem with underreporting when it comes to these cases. Efforts like the friendly space policies aim to contribute to establish a societal climate where people feel safe and that makes all people aware, that inappropriate behavior has consequences.   Publicly judging and ridiculing efforts to find a process, suitable to make all people feel safe, heard, and, if necessary, taken seriously at events, can set back efforts of creating such a process. Measures like friendly space policies are not self-evident, they are an hard fought for achievement. Seeing, how fast those efforts are being called into question, is quite disheartening and worries me a lot.   I am very grateful to work for and with a movement that has agreed on trying to make all people feel welcome and respected. I hope that we will keep fostering this together.   best Lilli   [1] http://www.equineteurope.org/IMG/pdf/fra_9dec2014.pdf -- Lilli Iliev Projektmanagerin Politik project manager public policy   Wikimedia Deutschland e.V. | Tempelhofer Ufer 23-24 | 10963 Berlin Tel. (030) 219 158 26-0 http://wikimedia.de Stellen Sie sich eine Welt vor, in der jeder Mensch an der Menge allen Wissens frei teilhaben kann. Helfen Sie uns dabei! http://spenden.wikimedia.de/ Wikimedia Deutschland - Gesellschaft zur Förderung Freien Wissens e.V. Eingetragen im Vereinsregister des Amtsgerichts Berlin-Charlottenburg unter der Nummer 23855 B. Als gemeinnützig anerkannt durch das Finanzamt für Körperschaften I Berlin, Steuernummer 27/029/42207   Mail priva di virus. www.avast.com _______________________________________________ Wikimania-l mailing list Wikimania-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimania-l --- Questa e-mail è stata controllata per individuare virus con Avast antivirus. https://www.avast.com/antivirus

White female speaking: this is an important discussion for EVERYONE. I will refrain from replying often as I was upset by the incident in CT, and I have personal experience of an incident at Wikimania 2016, and thus I find it hard to not get carried away. So I will reiterate that TRANSPARENCY is what we need. (And in reply to WMF input to this thread: just because the Trust & Safety team bears the name does not mean that they unconditionally deserve our trust, nor that our safety is safeguarded. Names and titles abound in society. If content adhered to name there would be no need for dispute and conflict) On Mon, 30 Jul 2018, 10:53 Pine W, &lt;wiki.pine(a)gmail.com&gt; wrote:

Il giorno lun 30 lug 2018 alle ore 12:57 Deryck Chan &lt;deryckchan(a)gmail.com&gt; ha scritto: +2. Just to let you know, Wikimedia Italia has recently approved a Code of Conduct,[1] roughly based on WMF's Friendly Space Policy, with the difference that we explicitly stated that the person that gets sanctioned in light of the Code of Conduct has the right to know why the sanction has been taken. I think *this* would be the one and only amendment that we should do to the FSP. It doesn't have to be publicly announced by Katherine or Jimbo to the whole assembly, but at least it'd be nice for the person affected to know. There's also another thing we should do, but this cannot be an amendment to the FSP. I quote directly DaB. on this: Il giorno lun 30 lug 2018 alle ore 02:24 DaB. &lt;wp(a)dabpunkt.eu&gt; ha scritto: I know that somebody would feel... weird in asking certain things, or to respect certain things. I know what it's like, because I live in constant fear of "doing the wrong thing", since I too have some minor problems in approaching new people, and sometimes overthink too much the weight of my words or actions. Asking politely not to do certain things to me is perfect, but in a way we should remember Wikimania or any other wiki event is NOT an hostile environment - quite the opposite. In my experience, I found wiki events the perfect environment to step up a bit my "social skills", because I know this is *my* people I'm addressing, let's not forget that. L. [1] https://wiki.wikimedia.it/wiki/Codice_di_condotta (Italian only)

Probably the best thing that can happen to this thread now is that it dies off, but I did just want to respond to this point by Pine, because it's really important: Men (add well-educated, straight, able-bodied, wealthy if you wish) from whatever ethnic group is most prominent in the country they live in have a different experience of life to everyone else. Harassment, bullying and various other forms of discrimination are much more frequent , even normal, for women, people from ethnic minorities, LGBT people, and others who don't match that description. So a conversation mainly conducted by white men about something like a Friendly Space Policy is mainly being conducted by people who do not experience the issue that the Friendly Space Policy is designed to address. Or if they do experience it, it's an unusual thing that's easy to laugh off. Therefore this kind of conversation is much more likely to conclude that there isn't a real problem, or the policy isn't working, or other things are more important (e.g. being REALLY TRANSPARENT ABOUT EVERYTHING), or whatever has happened in a particular case isn't an issue. Which, predictably enough, is *exactly* what has happened in this conversation. Regards, Chris