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Rebuilt? Why? Do you read the code of conduct when you attend a conference? Personally, I haven't even read the code of conduct for my job, and certainly would

Rebuilt? Why? Do you read the code of conduct when you attend a conference? Personally, I haven't even read the code of conduct for my job, and certainly wouldn't read one if I was speaking at or attending a conference. The CoCs are completely unnecessary and, as shown in this example, arbitrarily enforced. In the blog post I read that their CoC prohibits threats and assaults. Consider how silly that is. If someone's threatening you or sexually assaulting you you're going to go the police, not report them for a code of conduct violation. Likewise, for more mundane stuff, it's all common sense. Don't be obnoxious, rude, make people uncomfortable, etc. If you are doing that, they'll ask you to leave and ban you from future attendance if it's severe. You shouldn't need a CoC to know that and they don't need one to do it. Consider something that's not covered by their CoC. Maybe I bring my pet skunk with me and they don't have a provision about skunks in their CoC. Are they now powerless? No, they're going to do what's sensible and ask me to not have the skunk, and if I say "Your code of conduct doesn't prohibit skunks" they're going to ask me to leave. Codes of conduct are silly. They create these dumb regulations and committees for no real reason and create the apparatus for mistakes like these. I'm actually shocked that Jeremy supported and still supports codes of conduct. He seems like a smart guy and they're obviously a bad idea.

wslack 6y ago
> The CoCs are completely unnecessary Where do you think they come from? The issues that people have to deal with at conferences aren't new [1] - and when the offender is a friend of the organizer, or works on their team, having a predefined process is good. It also means that people can't say "I didn't know it wasn't ok to ____" or "XXX punishment is too harsh" - a common issue with poor actors. A CoC means you can take action with less effort and drama when someone is being a jerk. 1: http://jessnevins.com/blog/?p=796 http://jessnevins.com/blog/?p=796
- ALittleLight 6y ago
  I'm not sure I'd describe multiple committee meetings, emails, and phone calls as less work or less drama. If someone is causing a problem ask them to leave and/or ban them. Maybe you need some policy internally that says who handles complaints of this kind, but you don't need to tell all conference attendees they aren't allowed to threaten one another or assault each other. As far as friends of the organizers, I assume that's not settled with CoCs either. I bet if Jeremy were good friends with the right people this wouldn't have happened at all. Maybe it's not solved either in the CoC-free case, but I don't think it's worse and I think it's a relatively rare thing anyway. It's not just correct to say that "people can't say..." Of course they can. People don't read the codes of conduct and don't know that they say. Even if they did know, the language is bound to contain ambiguity. Jeremy, for example, didn't know he wasn't allowed to disagree with people. Genuine question for you: do you read the code of conduct at conferences you go to?
doubleunplussed 6y ago
He may not support them, but in the current culture you have to pretend to otherwise people might think you're a sexist or a racist. I don't support them, but I pretend to.
- tester34 6y ago
  It's pretty sad.
- hkon 6y ago
  Somewhere along the lines disagreeing with kafkaesque processes like OP experienced, became similar to professional suicide, so I understand you completely.
- DarkCrusader2 6y ago
  > you have to pretend to otherwise people might think you're a sexist or a racist Or quickly get you fired by shaming you employer. No one want to jeopardize their jobs.
- Aeolun 6y ago
  Huh, TIL I’m a sexist and/or racist.
  - mcny 6y ago
    > Huh, TIL I’m a sexist and/or racist. I think the meta is we have to understand we are all *-ist at some level. This is the world we were born and raised in and it is incredibly silly for me to suggest that I am somehow above my nurture. Of course, I will deny everything if you find my real name and attach it to this post because we can't really say this out loud but just between us I think the key is to understand that we all have inherent biases and actively try to fight ones that we consider not helpful.
    - Aeolun 6y ago
      I agree, but I think it’s silly that we have to pretend to agree with stupid SJW policies just because people are afraid of the backlash if someone traces their account name back to their real name. Since it’s fairly unlikely for similar resistance to have any effect on my career, I kind of feel inclined to always respond according to what I think, instead of what people like to hear. In this case it actually garnered downvotes, which I found fairly surprising, given, like you said, that we all have inherent biases.
goatinaboat 6y ago
The CoCs are completely unnecessary and, as shown in this example, arbitrarily enforced But that was always the point of them. Sure they have some nice words about equality and so on, but the purpose was always to give those who produce nothing themselves power over those that do. Look at the way long standing projects have had CoC’s forced on them by recently-arrived outsiders who have barely contributed a single line of code. Look at who the first targets of the CoC committee are. It’s just bullying.
blub 6y ago
They're useless for their stated purpose, but they're quite useful for their real purpose: as a punishment tool used by social justice sadists which are parasitizing projects conferences and organizations.
- KnobbleMcKnees 6y ago
  This is the saddest part of all; not because of the toxic influence of these bad actors, but because it detracts from actual issues of discrimination and misconduct. What does anyone think happens when an organizer breaks the code of conduct? I can write the list of actions here:
  - techdragon 6y ago
    Counterpoint to nothing happens when it’s the organisers violating the CoC. PyCon AU 2019 https://2019.pycon-au.org/news/inclusivity-and-political-statements/ https://2019.pycon-au.org/news/inclusivity-and-political-sta...
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- throwaway0a5e 6y ago
  Doesn't even have to be social justice sadists. They're ripe for arbitrary enforcement and likewise can be used by people with power to direct the enforcement people against anyone they don't like. Depending how cynical you want to be that's arguably the point of them.
  - himinlomax 6y ago
    The fact that they're social justice types is an historical detail, in the 50s it was the McCarthy red scare types for instance. Overall it's the same kind of people, authoritarian/social dominants; see https://theauthoritarians.org/ https://theauthoritarians.org/
roenxi 6y ago
> The CoCs are completely unnecessary and... If there are multiple organisers of a conference then it makes sense for them to talk amongst themselves, decide what they disagree on, and document it. Say I believe no swearing and no pink shirts and my co-organiser thinks no swearing and no blue shirts. It makes sense for us to sit down before the conference and document our official stance on those issues. Then when I see someone wearing a pink (or blue) shirt I know how to respond without starting a fight on the day with my co-organiser. That sort of CoC makes sense - one that the organisers use to settle their own disputes. CoC implemented as part of some sort of rules-lawyering process are a waste of time. The as-written CoC is meaningless compared to what people organising the conference agree on.
- quanticle 6y ago
  Say I believe no swearing and no pink shirts and my co-organiser thinks no swearing and no blue shirts. It makes sense for us to sit down before the conference and document our official stance on those issues. Then when I see someone wearing a pink (or blue) shirt I know how to respond without starting a fight on the day with my co-organiser. The problem is that you'll never be able to write things down in a sufficient level of detail in a CoC to avoid this situation. Sure, your CoC details what to do when someone wears a pink shirt or a blue shirt. But what happens when someone comes in wearing a purple shirt, and you co-organizer kicks them out because "that shade of purple is too close to blue"? I agree that conference and event organizers and moderators ought to sit down together and figure out how they resolve disputes among themselves. I disagree that a Code of Conduct is helpful in facilitating that.
pron 6y ago
Have you read all the laws in your country? Are you aware that there are probably thousands of examples where they've been arbitrarily enforced and put innocent people in prison (or even executed them)? Many of them are just a matter of common sense and yet there's an entire apparatus around them. Does that mean they're silly and useless? I've never organised a conference, but people who have told me that there's a level of craziness that most attendees or speakers aren't exposed to. I don't know if a code of conduct makes their job easier or not, but your glib dismissal fails to take into account that conference organisers don't enjoy judicial immunity and enforcement of anything -- be it written in a code of conduct or just common sense -- can make them liable for damages. One way to protect yourself is with a system of due process, and some lawyers think that a written code is helpful in establishing due process while others disagree.
- treeman79 6y ago
  Elections hand book is thousands of of rules. Usually one or more deaths behind each of those rules. Stupid rules come about because someone somewhere got screwed over.
- ALittleLight 6y ago
  Many laws are silly and useless. Many laws are ambiguous. Sometimes you read a law and think you know what it means but it turns out it applies where you don't expect and doesn't apply where you do expect. The law is complicated and expensive and painful. You need lawyers and judges and juries. People are, as you observe, severely hurt by the law. These are reasons why we don't need some pseudo sub-law drafted quickly by amateurs. The real law still applies and the fake law is arbitrarily enforced.
  - pron 6y ago
    Obviously there are pros and cons, but one cannot conclude that one way is worse than another if you only look at the bad outcomes of that one way. You need to compare the overall picture of both ways.
kazagistar 6y ago
You can't go to the police for someone making racist or sensitive insults. The problem isn't the CoC concept, because there exists a domain of actions that strictly speaking are legal but warrent expulsion from a professional community. The problem here is gross overreach and power without democratic control.
- joijoiwejrr 6y ago
  > You can't go to the police for someone making racist or sensitive insults. You can in the UK: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-23128956 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-23128956
  - mcv 6y ago
    That doesn't really chance GP's argument. There are a lot of countries where it's not illegal. Should it be? A lot of people would disagree with banning every kind of insensitive behaviour by law. And yet a conference might not want to host that kind of behaviour in their event, and want to make clear what kind of behaviour they find acceptable or unacceptable. Especially for such temporary events, it's useful to have clear lines and guidelines about what's acceptable and what not, especially in a society where some people don't seem to know or care. But that doesn't mean everything should immediately be legislated by law.
tomohawk 6y ago
As far as I can tell, CoCs exist merely to provide a pretext for actions that a committee would take anyway. "See, we're justified in doing this because we have a CoC! We're not arbitrary at all!"
bccdee 6y ago
"Why should rules exist? We should just operate on intuitive feelings of what is or isn't acceptable all the time." Why NOT formalize rules to some extent? Having a hidden set of implicit mores is far worse. In fact, you can easily read this post as a pro-COC argument. After all, the author is able to make a really strong case that he didn't really infringe on any part of the COC, and that the COC was poorly constructed to begin with. With no COC, he'd have to just be saying "I think Numfocus exercised bad judgement," which is a much harder argument to make since it's so subjective. We're professionals. Rules shouldn't be implicit in professional environments. Explicit rules are easier to use, and they make it easier to hold the authorities accountable for misusing them.
- superzamp 6y ago
  > If someone's threatening you or sexually assaulting you you're going to go the police, not report them for a code of conduct violation. I think they're right on point with this. Law is incredibly complex and you're likely to end up with a very shitty sub-implementation of the law when building a code of conduct, be it in itself or the application & litigation procedure. "Be nice to each other & follow the local official regulations" should probably be a valid c&c.
  - treeman79 6y ago
    Worked briefly at a place where male developers were actively harassing female employees. Not extreme, but clearly unwanted behavior. 20 years professional work, first time Ive ever seen that. Noped out of there as fast I could. Now, As a white male, I’ve seen it going the other way much more lately. Walk into a place where it’s all about diversity and tolerance, but failing, because hiring for diversity means passing on experience. Or frankly interest in doing the job. So spent months cleaning up messes. The entire time everyone is bashing white males, unless non-binary.
    - shatteredvisage 6y ago
      Preach brother. Preach.
pmjones 6y ago
> I'm actually shocked that Jeremy supported and still supports codes of conduct. He seems like a smart guy and they're obviously a bad idea. He's exhibiting Stockholm Syndrome. Being smart, in this case, just makes him very good at rationalizing it to himself.
wrsh07 6y ago
Fwiw, I know someone who wasn't able to get a police report for assault but was able to ban someone from an event. If you're interested in making spaces more welcoming and existing legal structures aren't doing the job, codes of conduct are extremely valuable.
- creato 6y ago
  This might sound bad especially to you or the someone you know, but if the legal system (criminal or civil) was not able to act (presumably due to lack of evidence), then I don't think events or other organizations should act either.
  - wrsh07 6y ago
    I actually disagree The whole point is that the legal system is very slow, very hard to report to, and in some cases actively discourages assault / rape claims. CoCs can do better because they don't require as involved of a process I'm not too worried about someone being banned from an event on hearsay, but I am very concerned about serial harassers The former, while unfortunate, is not career ending. It just means they can't go back to that event. The latter scars many people and will likely cause some of them to leave tech. Also none of them will ever come back to that event.
    - ALittleLight 6y ago
      I think that's covered by the CoC free case too. If there is or isn't a CoC and you convince the organizer that someone assaulted you, the organizer can and should ban them.
      - wrsh07 6y ago
        Without a CoC, it's hard to know who to talk to. Conference organizers are swamped. In another comment I elaborate on what the point of a CoC is: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24930887 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24930887
  - 6y ago
okprod 6y ago
Some conferences ask you to check a box that you've read and agree to the CoC before your speaking/attendance registration can go through. What do you do in those situations / do you just check those anyway or not attend?
- ghaff 6y ago
  Honestly, I do the same thing as with just about any "I agree to these terms and conditions," etc. boxes. I check it and move on like just about everyone else. I assume there's nothing especially egregious or unusual in there.
mcv 6y ago
> "The CoCs are completely unnecessary and, as shown in this example, arbitrarily enforced." The whole point of CoCs is to avoid this arbitrary enforcement. The problem in this particular case seems to be that they ignored their own CoC and picked on someone who didn't violate their CoC, while the committee did violate the CoC. That situation is indistinguishable from not having a CoC at all. If you've got a CoC, it needs to be clear, and you need to be consistent about how you enforce it. It has been shown plenty of times that if you don't have a CoC, there will be some people who think that racist or sexist jokes, sexual harassment, etc., are okay. They are not, and a CoC can help to make that clear. But you have to take your own CoC seriously and follow it, and not use it as an arbitrary excuse to harass people, like what seems to have happened here.
- ghaff 6y ago
  You'll never be able to completely encode everything. Someone takes offense at criticism or a joke that the vast majority would think was completely inoffensive or someone who cursed once, etc. At that point, you have two choices. Tell them "Welp, no." or at least mildly tap the speaker etc. on the wrist. (Or, I suppose, just lie and tell the person you'll take care of it and then don't.)
  - mcv 6y ago
    Of course you always need some common sense in the process. But it needs to be sense, and not arbitrary, capricious behaviour. And you're right that's something you can never quite encode in the rules. But that doesn't mean we shouldn't have them. Real world laws are also subject to interpretation, with tons of unclear edge cases, but it's still good that they ban murder, theft, and those kind of things. But yeah, except in extreme cases, I would expect an organisation of such an event to indeed mildly tap the offender on the wrist and maybe help to prevent it in the future. Or tell the complainer that it's not actually a violation of the CoC when it isn't. Not everything needs to be punished. Just informing people is often enough.
  - akiselev 6y ago
    > You'll never be able to completely encode everything. No resilient human system expects everything to be completely encoded in a written statement - it's entirely unreasonable, akin to asking one prove that unicorns don't exist. The devil is in the implementation details and how the CoC is wielded.

wslack 6y ago

> The CoCs are completely unnecessary Where do you think they come from? The issues that people have to deal with at conferences aren't new [1] - and when the offender is a friend of the organizer, or works on their team, having a predefined process is good. It also means that people can't say "I didn't know it wasn't ok to ____" or "XXX punishment is too harsh" - a common issue with poor actors. A CoC means you can take action with less effort and drama when someone is being a jerk. 1: http://jessnevins.com/blog/?p=796 http://jessnevins.com/blog/?p=796

ALittleLight 6y ago
I'm not sure I'd describe multiple committee meetings, emails, and phone calls as less work or less drama. If someone is causing a problem ask them to leave and/or ban them. Maybe you need some policy internally that says who handles complaints of this kind, but you don't need to tell all conference attendees they aren't allowed to threaten one another or assault each other. As far as friends of the organizers, I assume that's not settled with CoCs either. I bet if Jeremy were good friends with the right people this wouldn't have happened at all. Maybe it's not solved either in the CoC-free case, but I don't think it's worse and I think it's a relatively rare thing anyway. It's not just correct to say that "people can't say..." Of course they can. People don't read the codes of conduct and don't know that they say. Even if they did know, the language is bound to contain ambiguity. Jeremy, for example, didn't know he wasn't allowed to disagree with people. Genuine question for you: do you read the code of conduct at conferences you go to?

doubleunplussed 6y ago

He may not support them, but in the current culture you have to pretend to otherwise people might think you're a sexist or a racist. I don't support them, but I pretend to.

tester34 6y ago
It's pretty sad.
hkon 6y ago
Somewhere along the lines disagreeing with kafkaesque processes like OP experienced, became similar to professional suicide, so I understand you completely.
DarkCrusader2 6y ago
> you have to pretend to otherwise people might think you're a sexist or a racist Or quickly get you fired by shaming you employer. No one want to jeopardize their jobs.
Aeolun 6y ago
Huh, TIL I’m a sexist and/or racist.
- mcny 6y ago
  > Huh, TIL I’m a sexist and/or racist. I think the meta is we have to understand we are all *-ist at some level. This is the world we were born and raised in and it is incredibly silly for me to suggest that I am somehow above my nurture. Of course, I will deny everything if you find my real name and attach it to this post because we can't really say this out loud but just between us I think the key is to understand that we all have inherent biases and actively try to fight ones that we consider not helpful.
  - Aeolun 6y ago
    I agree, but I think it’s silly that we have to pretend to agree with stupid SJW policies just because people are afraid of the backlash if someone traces their account name back to their real name. Since it’s fairly unlikely for similar resistance to have any effect on my career, I kind of feel inclined to always respond according to what I think, instead of what people like to hear. In this case it actually garnered downvotes, which I found fairly surprising, given, like you said, that we all have inherent biases.

goatinaboat 6y ago

The CoCs are completely unnecessary and, as shown in this example, arbitrarily enforced But that was always the point of them. Sure they have some nice words about equality and so on, but the purpose was always to give those who produce nothing themselves power over those that do. Look at the way long standing projects have had CoC’s forced on them by recently-arrived outsiders who have barely contributed a single line of code. Look at who the first targets of the CoC committee are. It’s just bullying.

blub 6y ago

They're useless for their stated purpose, but they're quite useful for their real purpose: as a punishment tool used by social justice sadists which are parasitizing projects conferences and organizations.

KnobbleMcKnees 6y ago
This is the saddest part of all; not because of the toxic influence of these bad actors, but because it detracts from actual issues of discrimination and misconduct. What does anyone think happens when an organizer breaks the code of conduct? I can write the list of actions here:
- techdragon 6y ago
  Counterpoint to nothing happens when it’s the organisers violating the CoC. PyCon AU 2019 https://2019.pycon-au.org/news/inclusivity-and-political-statements/ https://2019.pycon-au.org/news/inclusivity-and-political-sta...
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
throwaway0a5e 6y ago
Doesn't even have to be social justice sadists. They're ripe for arbitrary enforcement and likewise can be used by people with power to direct the enforcement people against anyone they don't like. Depending how cynical you want to be that's arguably the point of them.
- himinlomax 6y ago
  The fact that they're social justice types is an historical detail, in the 50s it was the McCarthy red scare types for instance. Overall it's the same kind of people, authoritarian/social dominants; see https://theauthoritarians.org/ https://theauthoritarians.org/

roenxi 6y ago

> The CoCs are completely unnecessary and... If there are multiple organisers of a conference then it makes sense for them to talk amongst themselves, decide what they disagree on, and document it. Say I believe no swearing and no pink shirts and my co-organiser thinks no swearing and no blue shirts. It makes sense for us to sit down before the conference and document our official stance on those issues. Then when I see someone wearing a pink (or blue) shirt I know how to respond without starting a fight on the day with my co-organiser. That sort of CoC makes sense - one that the organisers use to settle their own disputes. CoC implemented as part of some sort of rules-lawyering process are a waste of time. The as-written CoC is meaningless compared to what people organising the conference agree on.

quanticle 6y ago
Say I believe no swearing and no pink shirts and my co-organiser thinks no swearing and no blue shirts. It makes sense for us to sit down before the conference and document our official stance on those issues. Then when I see someone wearing a pink (or blue) shirt I know how to respond without starting a fight on the day with my co-organiser. The problem is that you'll never be able to write things down in a sufficient level of detail in a CoC to avoid this situation. Sure, your CoC details what to do when someone wears a pink shirt or a blue shirt. But what happens when someone comes in wearing a purple shirt, and you co-organizer kicks them out because "that shade of purple is too close to blue"? I agree that conference and event organizers and moderators ought to sit down together and figure out how they resolve disputes among themselves. I disagree that a Code of Conduct is helpful in facilitating that.

pron 6y ago

Have you read all the laws in your country? Are you aware that there are probably thousands of examples where they've been arbitrarily enforced and put innocent people in prison (or even executed them)? Many of them are just a matter of common sense and yet there's an entire apparatus around them. Does that mean they're silly and useless? I've never organised a conference, but people who have told me that there's a level of craziness that most attendees or speakers aren't exposed to. I don't know if a code of conduct makes their job easier or not, but your glib dismissal fails to take into account that conference organisers don't enjoy judicial immunity and enforcement of anything -- be it written in a code of conduct or just common sense -- can make them liable for damages. One way to protect yourself is with a system of due process, and some lawyers think that a written code is helpful in establishing due process while others disagree.

treeman79 6y ago
Elections hand book is thousands of of rules. Usually one or more deaths behind each of those rules. Stupid rules come about because someone somewhere got screwed over.
ALittleLight 6y ago
Many laws are silly and useless. Many laws are ambiguous. Sometimes you read a law and think you know what it means but it turns out it applies where you don't expect and doesn't apply where you do expect. The law is complicated and expensive and painful. You need lawyers and judges and juries. People are, as you observe, severely hurt by the law. These are reasons why we don't need some pseudo sub-law drafted quickly by amateurs. The real law still applies and the fake law is arbitrarily enforced.
- pron 6y ago
  Obviously there are pros and cons, but one cannot conclude that one way is worse than another if you only look at the bad outcomes of that one way. You need to compare the overall picture of both ways.

kazagistar 6y ago

You can't go to the police for someone making racist or sensitive insults. The problem isn't the CoC concept, because there exists a domain of actions that strictly speaking are legal but warrent expulsion from a professional community. The problem here is gross overreach and power without democratic control.

joijoiwejrr 6y ago
> You can't go to the police for someone making racist or sensitive insults. You can in the UK: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-23128956 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-23128956
- mcv 6y ago
  That doesn't really chance GP's argument. There are a lot of countries where it's not illegal. Should it be? A lot of people would disagree with banning every kind of insensitive behaviour by law. And yet a conference might not want to host that kind of behaviour in their event, and want to make clear what kind of behaviour they find acceptable or unacceptable. Especially for such temporary events, it's useful to have clear lines and guidelines about what's acceptable and what not, especially in a society where some people don't seem to know or care. But that doesn't mean everything should immediately be legislated by law.

tomohawk 6y ago

As far as I can tell, CoCs exist merely to provide a pretext for actions that a committee would take anyway. "See, we're justified in doing this because we have a CoC! We're not arbitrary at all!"

bccdee 6y ago

"Why should rules exist? We should just operate on intuitive feelings of what is or isn't acceptable all the time." Why NOT formalize rules to some extent? Having a hidden set of implicit mores is far worse. In fact, you can easily read this post as a pro-COC argument. After all, the author is able to make a really strong case that he didn't really infringe on any part of the COC, and that the COC was poorly constructed to begin with. With no COC, he'd have to just be saying "I think Numfocus exercised bad judgement," which is a much harder argument to make since it's so subjective. We're professionals. Rules shouldn't be implicit in professional environments. Explicit rules are easier to use, and they make it easier to hold the authorities accountable for misusing them.

superzamp 6y ago
> If someone's threatening you or sexually assaulting you you're going to go the police, not report them for a code of conduct violation. I think they're right on point with this. Law is incredibly complex and you're likely to end up with a very shitty sub-implementation of the law when building a code of conduct, be it in itself or the application & litigation procedure. "Be nice to each other & follow the local official regulations" should probably be a valid c&c.
- treeman79 6y ago
  Worked briefly at a place where male developers were actively harassing female employees. Not extreme, but clearly unwanted behavior. 20 years professional work, first time Ive ever seen that. Noped out of there as fast I could. Now, As a white male, I’ve seen it going the other way much more lately. Walk into a place where it’s all about diversity and tolerance, but failing, because hiring for diversity means passing on experience. Or frankly interest in doing the job. So spent months cleaning up messes. The entire time everyone is bashing white males, unless non-binary.
  - shatteredvisage 6y ago
    Preach brother. Preach.

pmjones 6y ago

> I'm actually shocked that Jeremy supported and still supports codes of conduct. He seems like a smart guy and they're obviously a bad idea. He's exhibiting Stockholm Syndrome. Being smart, in this case, just makes him very good at rationalizing it to himself.

wrsh07 6y ago

Fwiw, I know someone who wasn't able to get a police report for assault but was able to ban someone from an event. If you're interested in making spaces more welcoming and existing legal structures aren't doing the job, codes of conduct are extremely valuable.

creato 6y ago
This might sound bad especially to you or the someone you know, but if the legal system (criminal or civil) was not able to act (presumably due to lack of evidence), then I don't think events or other organizations should act either.
- wrsh07 6y ago
  I actually disagree The whole point is that the legal system is very slow, very hard to report to, and in some cases actively discourages assault / rape claims. CoCs can do better because they don't require as involved of a process I'm not too worried about someone being banned from an event on hearsay, but I am very concerned about serial harassers The former, while unfortunate, is not career ending. It just means they can't go back to that event. The latter scars many people and will likely cause some of them to leave tech. Also none of them will ever come back to that event.
  - ALittleLight 6y ago
    I think that's covered by the CoC free case too. If there is or isn't a CoC and you convince the organizer that someone assaulted you, the organizer can and should ban them.
    - wrsh07 6y ago
      Without a CoC, it's hard to know who to talk to. Conference organizers are swamped. In another comment I elaborate on what the point of a CoC is: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24930887 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24930887
- 6y ago

okprod 6y ago

Some conferences ask you to check a box that you've read and agree to the CoC before your speaking/attendance registration can go through. What do you do in those situations / do you just check those anyway or not attend?

ghaff 6y ago
Honestly, I do the same thing as with just about any "I agree to these terms and conditions," etc. boxes. I check it and move on like just about everyone else. I assume there's nothing especially egregious or unusual in there.

mcv 6y ago

> "The CoCs are completely unnecessary and, as shown in this example, arbitrarily enforced." The whole point of CoCs is to avoid this arbitrary enforcement. The problem in this particular case seems to be that they ignored their own CoC and picked on someone who didn't violate their CoC, while the committee did violate the CoC. That situation is indistinguishable from not having a CoC at all. If you've got a CoC, it needs to be clear, and you need to be consistent about how you enforce it. It has been shown plenty of times that if you don't have a CoC, there will be some people who think that racist or sexist jokes, sexual harassment, etc., are okay. They are not, and a CoC can help to make that clear. But you have to take your own CoC seriously and follow it, and not use it as an arbitrary excuse to harass people, like what seems to have happened here.

ghaff 6y ago
You'll never be able to completely encode everything. Someone takes offense at criticism or a joke that the vast majority would think was completely inoffensive or someone who cursed once, etc. At that point, you have two choices. Tell them "Welp, no." or at least mildly tap the speaker etc. on the wrist. (Or, I suppose, just lie and tell the person you'll take care of it and then don't.)
- mcv 6y ago
  Of course you always need some common sense in the process. But it needs to be sense, and not arbitrary, capricious behaviour. And you're right that's something you can never quite encode in the rules. But that doesn't mean we shouldn't have them. Real world laws are also subject to interpretation, with tons of unclear edge cases, but it's still good that they ban murder, theft, and those kind of things. But yeah, except in extreme cases, I would expect an organisation of such an event to indeed mildly tap the offender on the wrist and maybe help to prevent it in the future. Or tell the complainer that it's not actually a violation of the CoC when it isn't. Not everything needs to be punished. Just informing people is often enough.
- akiselev 6y ago
  > You'll never be able to completely encode everything. No resilient human system expects everything to be completely encoded in a written statement - it's entirely unreasonable, akin to asking one prove that unicorns don't exist. The devil is in the implementation details and how the CoC is wielded.