Hi!
So, I am pro this policy. It's clean, neat, and easy to understand. However, in some ways, I feel that while a policy like this is a(n) (unfortunately) necessary tool to prevent discrimination and harassment at tech events, I do not think that it is sufficient. Let me explain.
In my mind, policies such as this are useful when you either a) want to kick someone who's actions are unacceptable out of your event or b) something bad happened and the organizer wants to be able to point to the policy and say "that was against our policy." These are both good things. Having conditions for ejection from an event is useful. However, in my mind, it does not address underlying issues, the variety of -isms, that contributed to harassment and discrimination. It has also been my experience in being around various folk at tech conferences (such as um... myself) that geeks like me often do not have 100% developed social skills and may already deal with feelings of isolation. Thus, what I would love to see would be, in addition to a policy such as this, activities specifically designed to foster closer community, connection, and to bring home that everyone at such an event is valuable, as well as establishing basic social expectations which can be very useful in social situations where participants come from a wide range of cultures and countries.
I am, at this moment, not sure what form this thing that I am advocating would take, but I would definitely be interested in working with others to come up with such activities/models/etc. It would probably happen at the beginning of an event, and it would need to be enjoyable, so that people would actually want to come. This is as far as I've managed to get in my brainstorming.
Thoughts? Ideas? Comments?
-peter
On Thu, Jan 12, 2012 at 4:47 PM, Sumana Harihareswara sumanah@wikimedia.org wrote:
Thanks, Danese. Right now this policy is limited to technical-only events for the reason you describe; I'm talking with other Wikimedia conference organizers to adjust wording for Wikimania and other not-just-technical events.
-Sumana
On 01/12/2012 04:40 PM, Danese Cooper wrote:
Well done, Sumana. I especially like the start of the exception list. Presumably situations such as academic discourse on body function (at a WMF conference on improving content), or depictions of artifacts (in the GLAM context) would be exceptions.
Danese
On Jan 12, 2012, at 8:00 AM, Sumana Harihareswara sumanah@wikimedia.org wrote:
The Wikimedia Foundation is dedicated to a harassment-free conference experience for everyone. I'm proposing a fairly short and standard anti-harassment policy of the type that's becoming best practice for tech conferences and hackathons.
Draft: https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/User:Sumanah/AHP
I don't imagine I'll get much response on this, but just wanted to put it out there before implementing. I intend on putting this into place by the middle of next week, in time for the San Francisco hackathon (starting January 20th).
Comments on the talk page, please.
Sumana Harihareswara Volunteer Development Coordinator Wikimedia Foundation
Wikitech-l mailing list Wikitech-l@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
Wikitech-l mailing list Wikitech-l@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l