[Battlemesh] Code of conduct

[Mitar]

Hi!

> No, it isn't, Barbara.  It's more like saying that in a small house where
> everyone knows the layout, having a dedicated fire exit is not necessary,
> the normal exists should be good enough.

This is a great example, Juliusz. You are assuming that Battlemesh is a
small family house where everyone knows everyone and ways of conduct are
already established, even if they are not written out.

And I think that as house and community grows, becomes more than just a
family, but a village, global one, it is good to write down some common
things we share, so that community can grow in a healthy way.

Again, those rules are to help exceptional cases. If we would look at a
general case, we are an amazing community.

> Analoguously, we expect that the usual social mechanisms work fine at
> Battlemesh.  This includes telling people to calm down when they become
> aggressive, saying "that joke is in bad taste, let's change the subject",
> walking out or even interrupting a talk that more than one person finds
> offensive.

You assume here that all issues will be happening only in public, or
that victims will be willing to go public to get (hopefully) response.
Or that they will be able enough to handle the situation themselves.

Also, I think it is good that we would discuss in advance which types of
issues are not acceptable, at least give few examples of those, so that
we as a community agree to them in advance. I really worry that when
something problematic happens we as a community will instead of
addressing the needs of the victim start a meta-physical discussion if
that, instead of having some ground knowledge about that prepared in
advance.

Moreover, keep in mind that code of conduct is for those who are not yet
part of the community, who are just joining. Not for those who already
feel welcome and established in the community. For the latter it is
clear that they feel safe and welcomed in the community and are coming
back. But what about those who are not coming back? Or who will never
come because they will be unclear how things are? Based on experience of
other open source communities and conferences, one important aspect
identified by all those, to address those issues, was a published code
of conduct. You can pretend that this is not so, but again, you are most
probably not the person for whom the code of conduct is meant to provide
some encouragement.

Will be really one of the rare conferences which believes code of
conduct is not necessary? Even CCC has it:

https://events.ccc.de/congress/2012/wiki/29C3_Anti-Harassment_Policy

See the long list here:

http://geekfeminism.wikia.com/wiki/Conference_anti-harassment/Adoption


Mitar

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