Hi,
On Thu, Aug 13, 2015 at 11:30 PM, rupert THURNER rupert.thurner@gmail.com wrote:
In general, Matt, I do experience that the wikimedia movement is criticized having too many rules and policies. Add another one does not help.
Years ago I was among the ones that would strongly oppose to a Code of Conduct for some of the reasons mentioned in this thread (there is proof somewhere in the GNOME project archives). Basically, that a written policy cannot help as much as common sense and community pressure. Since then, I have learned several things:
* Turns out that statistically speaking my thoughts at the time fit very well with my profile in terms of gender, age, geographical location, ethnic/social/economic/academic background, fluency in written English, individualism, extrovertism... This was/is the mainstream profile in free software projects but is just one of the many profiles possible in a free software project on a more diverse and global scale. The more we care about growth and diversity, the more we need to care about feeling welcomed and safe in terms different than what makes some of us feel welcomed and safe. When discussing a CoC, we are also discussing for those that are not here but might one day.
* I have seen very competent, productive and admirable volunteers, professionals, and contributors combining both roles, taking a break or leaving completely after saying to whoever wanted to listen something along the lines of "I don't need to go through this; there are many other interesting venues out there." If you don't know anyone perhaps it's because you haven't been long or deep enough. When discussing a CoC, we don't get the opinions of those that left already, but we can still exercise our memory and reflect.
* I have learned about first time contributors and also about experienced contributors talking about their first experiences lurking in our channels or remembering their first impressions during their first steps in our community. Some events that for me passed unnoticed or were normal/ok had impressed these newcomers and had been found not normal and not ok by them. Sometimes I would not even be sure whether a specific exchange had been fair, understandable or not, again because communication styles and offended feelings are very subjective, and there was no clear guideline to check.
I still think that no piece of paper or wiki page will solve anything as good as a solid social convention, but now I do think that in a context like ours a wiki page can help solidifying a social convention. I also believe that a percentage of harassment and abuse happens because of personal bias or lack of awareness, sensitivity, or after-thought by those creating such situations, and having such wiki page can help preventing that percentage just by having a text written and approved by the community. Finally, I'm also convinced that a number of offenses go unreported and are swallowed by those suffering them just because we have no clear guideline of how to recognize inappropriate behavior, what to do when you see it or suffer it, and which guarantees does anyone have that a complaint will be addressed by someone without causing more pain to the people suffering.
So yes, even before starting to talk about the "bureaucracy" of how to define, enforce, appeal, etc, I think a wiki page titled Code of Conduct and approved by the Wikimedia tech community will be very useful to acknowledge a real problem and to deal with it. It is also good to discuss it now that it is quite peaceful, rather than in one of those stormy phases that we allow to ourselves from time to time.