
Django Code of Conduct - feedback wanted - jacobian
https://www.djangoproject.com/weblog/2013/apr/01/django-code-conduct-feedback-wanted/
======
mladenkovacevic
I think it's great to have a set of ground rules and expectations when
interacting with people you might not have a completely defined personal
relationship but here is where any kind of agreement/code kinda falls apart: "
Sexist, racist, and other discriminatory jokes are not welcome".

What is sexist language? In the recent Pycon incident was the "dongle joke"
sexist language? I don't think so. It's a joke about the male anatomy that
should be equally accessible to men and women. Is a joke about blondes being
stupid sexist? Yes, probably.

What I'm saying is language like "sexist" or "offensive" is highly subjective
and it's impossible for everyone to agree on the correct definitions. The
unavoidable fact of life is that a documented agreement cannot possibly
protect everyone from being offended at some point in their professional
lives. I feel like any kind of documented code of conduct should also include
a section on how to deal with feeling offended.

Something like this:

"Despite these rough guidelines, we are all imperfect human beings that
experience discrimination and offensive language in sometimes drastically
different ways so it's important not to overreact to what you may perceive to
be offensive or discriminatory actions. Ask yourself if the act in question is
motivated by malevolent intentions. Chances are that it's not and that they
simply have a different definition of what is acceptable in a professional
setting. Informing the person of your discomfort with their actions and/or
language will go a long way towards removing any future discomfort while
interacting with that individual."

~~~
heliostatic
I understand what you're saying here, but I think you've got it backwards,
even taking PyCon into account.

I think we both agree that it's best to assume everybody is acting in good
faith (you say as much in your proposed changes). As such, why not:

"Despite these rough guidelines, we are all imperfect human beings that
experience discrimination and offensive language in sometimes drastically
different ways so it's important to be aware that you might say something with
good intentions that nevertheless offends or upsets another member of the
community. In these cases, rather than explaining to that person why they
ought not be upset, apologize, try to understand why your comment upset them,
and move on."

------
lamby
For a long list of reasons, both philosophical and practical, I strongly
dislike the adoption of community code of conducts.

One reason that's not been mentioned elsewhere is that they make an act wrong
because it offends a magical set of rules, rather than the act being wrong in
its own right. Lawyers would recognise this as the difference between malum in
se vs malum prohibitum. I don't speak for anyone else, but this is not a
subtle difference for me.

The latter seems entirely at odds with a distributed and obstensibly non-
hierarchical open source project.

~~~
abraininavat
As if the line between malum in se and malum prohibitum was well defined. What
you consider a magical set of rules others consider basic requirements for
fostering an environment of respect and civil discourse.

I get that you don't agree. But you have no rational basis to assert that the
acts prohibited by the community code of conducts aren't malum in se.

------
jacobian
Hi folks - If you've got feedback that you'd like us to take into account, can
you please send it via the form
(<https://www.djangoproject.com/conduct/#feedback>)? I have a shitty memory,
and if you just leave suggestions here I'll probably forget 'em. Thanks!

~~~
ppinette
In the culture I was raised, the word "shitty" was highly offensive. I'm not
offended, but my childhood community would be.

------
parfe
> _This is censorship! I have the right to say whatever I want!_

 _You do -- in your space. If you'd like to hang out in our spaces (as
clarified above), we have some simple guidelines to follow. If you want to,
for example, form a group where Django is discussed using language
inappropriate for general channels then nobody's stopping you. We respect your
right to establish whatever codes of conduct you want in the spaces that
belong to you. Please honor this Code of Conduct in our spaces._

Excellently written answer to deal with the torrent of complaints spewed by
man-children at the requirement they be considerate of others. "My free
speeches!" and "How dare you censor me?" and "But what about my get-back-in-
the-kitchen and make-me-a-sandwich jokes?! You've killed comedy!"

~~~
tiredofcareer
Although I agree wholeheartedly with the code of conduct, it's disrespectful
to those who disagree to lump them together as you have done.

There will always be opposing viewpoints, even on things that we'd consider
nearly cut-and-dry like not talking about your penis at a conference. Respect
them and win with argument and logic, not with propaganda and bad posters
mocking them as a disingenuous group. (The censorship complaint, though
flawed, is a little more complex than you imply.)

~~~
jacobian
I'm sorry you feel that way; that wasn't our intent. If you've got ideas about
how we might improve it, please let us know:
<https://www.djangoproject.com/conduct/#feedback>.

~~~
jerrya
I know little about Django.

Have you really had a problem with the behavior of your participants that
requires this formal code of conduct as a solution?

Your code of conduct on its face seems innocuous, but there seems to be an
elephant that you are trying not to discuss.

As illustrated by great-grandparent, there seem to be many eager to take your
code of conduct and wielding it like a shield use it to bludgeon others with
behavior contrary to your intentions.

 _Excellently written answer to deal with the torrent of complaints spewed by
man-children at the requirement they be considerate of others. "My free
speeches!" and "How dare you censor me?" and "But what about my get-back-in-
the-kitchen and make-me-a-sandwich jokes?! You've killed comedy!"_

If I had a suggestion, it would be to take from the Wikipedia and _assume good
faith_ which is a principle that your Speak Up! source also dances around, in
that it seems a person can "assume bad faith" and still comply with each
principle in your code of conduct.

Don't be a dick. Do unto others.... Assume good faith.

Each of these seem to concisely cover the issues you have without leading to
their abuse, or tyranny of the (majority, minority).

------
nraynaud
Here are random thoughts for a Code of Conduct (not related to django, because
I only use the doc there):

-RTFM is not an acceptable answer without a link to a precise chapter (not to giant page).

-"this has been answered" is not an acceptable answer without a link to the previous answer/question, and if it's repeatedly sent, then it's time to change the software UI or the doc (in this order of preference).

-accessing the community (dev or user) should never force you to subscribe to a ML (we're in 2013, not 1993), or creating a password (use you imagination, github, or openID).

-stale/inaccurate pages on the wiki are to be removed (not marked as "old" or whatever) every 2 months. Don't create a wiki if you can't handle it (your time is probably better spent developing I guess).

-FAQs are useless, just change your intro/tuto/getting started or your UI.

------
publicfig
I really like this, not just because it works towards a community of
acceptance, but because the guidelines are laid out publicly. A lot of people
seem upset with the idea that they are being censored, but I really don't see
it as an absolutely horrible thing. Communities are moderated all the time,
but at least in this instance there is a publicly available set of guidelines
which one is capable of offering feedback on. I'd love to hear where people
differ with this opinion, but I really think this is a good thing for the
Django community.

------
hyperpape
You cite the Ada template, which says "sexual language and imagery" is
inappropriate for a conference or other public event. Your website only
mentions "sexist language".

From the tone and tenor of the post, I suspect you mean to endorse that aspect
of the template, and if so, you probably should state that clearly. Doing so
may help when inevitable disputes arise about whether someone's behavior
contradicted the code of conduct. You will almost never look back and say "I
really regret being clear".

Otherwise, my first thought is that I think this code is a good idea.

~~~
thisone
Personally, unless a statement against sexual language is qualified, I can't
find myself ever agreeing with it.

Why? Say I'm working in sexual health and create apps and websites around
sexual health. Does the sexual language prohibition mean that I must be
incredibly careful to not discuss the actual content of my work, even in the
most professional way?

~~~
kanja
Yes it means exactly that - There was a recent talk about sexual health that
was canceled because it ran against that rule.

[http://violetblue.tumblr.com/post/44107008572/what-
happened-...](http://violetblue.tumblr.com/post/44107008572/what-happened-
with-my-security-bsides-talk)

~~~
FireBeyond
I read that blog and the impression I got was that she was railroaded by the
"audience member".

An audience member who specifically asks if there's any "rape" discussion in
the talk, then, when discussion of date rape drugs occurs, the organizer says
that "the member mentioned that if you describe how to use date rape drugs..."

How does random audience member know that a talk will cover such drugs? That's
a very specific comment to make to complain. "Oh, if they talk about rape,
it's a trigger for me", "and if they explain how to use date rape drugs,
that's the same as rape".

Pseudo-edit: I read further down the article that indeed her talk was
targeted.

That being said, I have little sympathy for Violet Blue - she's been known to
have a litigious past based on changing her name and then invoking domain
squatting and trademark law against others who were around before her.

~~~
thisone
I come from the medical apps field, so I find the idea of possibly not being
able to talk about my work frightening.

Sex (any reference to the existence of sex, to crib from This American Life),
not okay. Religion or politics, okay. Odd.

------
stefantalpalaru
This is the first real news today that I wish was an April Fool's hoax.

~~~
benatkin
Yeah, me too. Chalk that up as an advantage Ruby on Rails has over Django.

~~~
stefantalpalaru
Remember, remember the conference in November[1]

[1]
[http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/11/20/british_ruby_confere...](http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/11/20/british_ruby_conference_cancelled_after_diversity_row/)

~~~
benatkin
ruby != rails

------
nraynaud
I love the idea of being "professional" on an open-source volunteers project:
put on a mask during the work day, and keep your mask at night. Then read
articles and watch movies about "being yourself", "finding your inner self"
and stuff like that all day long. When the dissonance is too great, your mind
break and it's depression, gun violence (in the US), suicide etc.

~~~
princess3000
Yes, you should be professional, the same way you'd probably be respectful at
a dinner party that occurred outside of work hours. This is about as
puritanical as a coffee shop that prevents you from bringing a guitar and
amplifier in and playing loud riffs at 4pm. If you want to remove your mask
then please, feel free to do so, but maybe find a more appropriate environment
for letting loose than the Django community forums.

Also, really? The idea that asking people on Django-hosted channels to "be
respectful" will lead to gun violence is pretty out there.

~~~
dalke
I have a difficult time with the phrase "professional." I used to think it had
some meaning. Now I think it's a code word for "don't do things that the
managers/organizers don't like."

Can I wear a pony suit to work and be professional? What about at DjangoCon?
What about wearing shorts and sandals? In some places they are acceptable, in
others they are not. Does that make them professional or not? So it seems like
DjangoCon allows certain types of non-professional conduct.

Is it professional to drink alcohol while at work in most programming
companies? What about taking a nap during someone's presentation? I don't
think so. Is the same true for DjangoCon? I don't think so. I've done both at
conferences, and people knew about it, and no one seemed to have a problem
with it. I've seen others do the same.

There's another meaning of "professional", which is to do quality work, and be
responsible for any errors that occurred. I don't think this is the type of
"professional" that people mean. I've not seen anyone kicked out or even
chided by the organizers for presenting a lousy and unprofessional
presentation.

As to the coffee shop example, that can be judged without reference to
respect. The goal of a coffee shop is to sell coffee. They have broad
discretion as to what they think is the way of achieving that goal. This is
based on property law. If they don't want you to play loud riffs at 4pm then
they don't have to claim there was disrespect, only that it's unwanted, and
they can use the credible threat of police response to back their demand that
you leave.

The neighbors also have some say in the matter. Loud music might be
prohibited, and your amp is turned up too high. Again, "respect" doesn't
factor into this at all.

But for a dinner party, or for Django, I don't think it's possible to have a
good definition of "professional" or "respectful." It comes down to the vague
"don't do things that we don't like, otherwise we'll kick you out." Using
"professional" just makes it sound more objective.

------
metaphorm
jacobian,

can we be more clear about tolerance of respectful dissent? I feel like the
language in the present draft of the document gives an overbearing feeling and
has aspects of thinly veiled political correctness enforcement.

please don't misunderstand my sentiment. i'm not meaning to excuse bigoted
language of any kind. i do, however, think that a code of conduct ought to be
much much much more clear that it is a set of guidelines for people to
interact WITH disagreement, rather than a set of rules for stifling dissent.

~~~
jacobian
Thanks a good suggestion; thanks. Can you repeat it via the feedback form
(<https://www.djangoproject.com/conduct/#feedback>) so that we don't lose
track of it?

------
zalew
I follow django-dev, sometimes drop into irc, and haven't seen anything
inappropriate in there. Did something happen I'm not aware of?

~~~
jacobian
Nope. We've been working on this for... quite a few months, actually.

~~~
zalew
so... aren't you solving a problem that doesn't exist in the django community?

~~~
jonknee
Which is the best time for these sort of things.

------
benatkin
> Be careful in the words that you choose.

Nice try in hiding the puritanical censorship aspect of it, but I'm not
fooled.

~~~
ubernostrum
In the Django community, as in Sparta, everyone is held accountable for the
words of his voice.

The main difference is that in Sparta they throw you in a gigantic pit; we
have a strong preference for talking it out and encouraging people to be nice
to each other.

------
d23
I've considered contributing to Django in the past but assumed I wasn't "good
enough" to do so. Seeing immediately gives me encouragement to try. I think
it's good.

~~~
stefantalpalaru
I did too. I looked for an issue I could handle[1], wrote a patch, improved
it, added tests and got over the fact that the Django guy at Europython 2012
was too busy to answer my questions during the dedicated sprint.

I even followed the bug tracker triage docs and tried to find a reviewer only
to get scolded for it[2]. Then I had to wait 20 days to get a response on the
patch. It was a "wontfix" because documented bugs are actually features.

But now that there's a code of conduct all this has changed and I feel the
urge to contribute again to Django /s

[1] <https://code.djangoproject.com/ticket/18494>

[2] [https://groups.google.com/d/topic/django-
developers/K95mZose...](https://groups.google.com/d/topic/django-
developers/K95mZoseH5E/discussion)

~~~
dalke
I looked as [2]. It doesn't look like a case of scolding. It's a one-liner
saying "there is no need to write to django-developers to notify us about
ticket changes, we do follow trac and there is an extra ML for ticket
updates."

I don't know the Django process, but this seems pretty standard. Your initial
post doesn't add anything new to what the patch already did. They were letting
you know that posting your request to the list won't speed up the process.

Unfortunately, with an all volunteer development team, it's hard to put time
aside to helping new people with what doesn't seem like critical patches. In
my observation, the way to solve this problem is to develop more patches,
including ones that are more critical. Critical/useful/neat patches get
priority. After you do a few of these, then you can get people interested in
your other patches, and/or become part of the core team.

Where you'll then find that your time is spent working on new core features,
and not enough time spent helping new people become core developers. ;)

For what it's worth, my oldest open bug reports are 10 years old. One for
Twisted, <http://twistedmatrix.com/trac/ticket/288> , and the other for
Python, <http://bugs.python.org/issue747320> . I still see occasional activity
about each.

~~~
stefantalpalaru
I tried to respect their documented process and find a reviewer for my patch
so the status of the issue can get one step closer to "closed". They
specifically mentioned IRC and this particular mailing list as ways to locate
reviewers. After waiting a couple of hours for a response on IRC, I wrote to
the mailing list.

~~~
dalke
Then you started off with the wrong email. You said "I've got a fix and a test
and now I need a reviewer to mark the ticket as RFC. Please take a look if
you're familiar with this area of Django."

That added nothing new, because anyone who would review it has already been
informed. That's what the reply told you. They have no idea who you are, or
what you know about the process, or even that you want to follow the process.

You then followed up with "How else am I supposed to find someone to review my
patch? I got no response on IRC." That does give the sense that you're
exasperated. That doesn't help them understand that you want to work with
them.

Also, your first email has the wrong tone, in several ways.

You wrote that you "need a reviewer to mark the ticket as RFC". That is a
presumptive view, because it assumes that a reviewer will mark the ticket as
RFC. The reviewer might say that it needs many changes, and pass it back to
you for continued development.

Second, the line "Please take a look if you're familiar with this area of
Django." is not helpful to the person reading the email. How does someone know
if they are familiar with that area without actually going to the bug? They
have to take a look. Which means that anyone who might review it will have to
take a look, no matter if they are familiar with it or not.

My belief is that if you had asked a question about the process, rather than
the patch, and explained how you were trying to work within the existing
process, then you would have gotten a more useful answer. For example:

"I've just contributed my first patch to Trac. Now I'm waiting for a reviewer.
I asked for one on IRC but got no answer after several hours. The contribute
FAQ suggests asking here as well. Can someone here review <url> for me?"

That's gentler than the email you first sent. It would have probably gotten an
answer like what the FAQ says:

Remember, "it’s not personal. Django is entirely developed by volunteers (even
the core devs), and sometimes folks just don’t have time."

Instead of developing a patch, what about reviewing the patches that others
have submitted? Do this enough times and someone will likely reciprocate.

~~~
stefantalpalaru
You're probably right about not being gentle enough. The "area of Django" I
was referring to had been mentioned in the email's subject, though.

As you might have guessed, that was my first and last try to contribute to
this particular open source project. I won't do it again. Maybe this attitude
is unusual in the subset of Django users who at some point want to contribute
something back to the community. Or maybe the core developers have the wrong
approach to encouraging new members of the community and instead of making
sure the process works they spend the time writing codes of conduct.

~~~
dalke
Fair enough (regarding the title).

As I wrote, what you saw here is typical of most volunteer-based project.
There's not enough people working on a project to cover all of the details,
and those people tend to do the things that interest them. Reviewing others'
patches is low on the list, unless it's something which involves them
directly.

It's likely that you'll get similar responses in other projects. As I wrote,
there are ways around it. Mostly be putting a lot more effort into helping the
project before you demand things from people. Again, I point out that a couple
of my bug reports are 10 years old, and still getting infrequent attention.

Another way to say this is that if you're the person who wants so much
attention or quick feedback, then you're not the type of person who would do
well in a volunteer-driven, distributed project. But there are other
volunteers who are a better fit, and the Django team doesn't know how to
specify which type they are looking for.

In any case, the response email wasn't scolding.

------
parnas
the fallout continues...

~~~
princess3000
Fallout generally means something negative. If this is related to the PyCon
incident (which it might not be, given that Django says they've been working
on it for some months) then the "fallout" is simply the adoption of a formal
document that says, in so many words, "don't be a jerk." The Django team has a
right to do whatever they please with the spaces they host and moderate, and
asking that users don't be jerks in these spaces is completely reasonable by
any metric.

~~~
nraynaud
The "jerk" definition will be jerky.

------
hacker789
Your guidelines look good, but how do you define "sexist" and "racist"?

Third-wave, post-modern feminists believe in a neat, well-defined hierarchy of
sexes and races; regardless of the specifics of a given case, members of a
"lower" group can _by definition_ never be sexist or racist to a member of a
"higher" group.

Is that your interpretation?

~~~
lclarkmichalek
Source for your claim about third wave feminists? Considering that you're
talking about a massive number of people when you say that, you're probably
wrong. The third wave was more just a shift towards a more general awareness
of the issues that women face, and the fact that things such as gender are not
as binary as the second wave may have presumed.

It's also odd that you think the third wave promotes a well-defined hierarchy
of sexes and races when a lot of what it is about is recognising that many
people fall outside of society's definitions of gender and sexual identity.
But as ever, I imagine much of this is just a semantic argument wrt your
definition of third wave postmodern feminists.

As for the Django leadership's definition of sexism and racism? Something
tells me they don't have a crazy proportion of people with the beliefs you
described, so they'll probably stick with the standard
"discrimination/prejudice against a gender/race/ethnicity/group/etc"

~~~
Joeboy
From the FAQ of the Feminism 101 site to which newcomers to the "feminisms"
subreddit are directed:

> feminists reject the notion that women can be sexist towards men because
> women lack the institutional power that men have.

I understand this to be the standard reasoning among contemporary feminists,
and the same reasoning is widely applied wrt racism.

~~~
dalke
Your understanding is incorrect. As several other comments in that thread
point out, "This is a viewpoint of some feminists, but it is _far_ from
consensus, and the first three users of the word “sexism” appear to have
disagreed with the writer" and "By claiming the term ‘sexism’ exclusively for
acts against women, aren’t we disenfranchising the men who also suffer?."

There's even the complaint that the given definition is inappropriate for a
Feminism 101 definition, saying "If I had no prior knowledge of feminist
theory or the contentions that really _abound_ in the rather amorphous field
of feminist theory, I would take what has been presented here as established
fact rather than a specific argument and one of many hypotheses on the matter
of “what sexism is.”"

I just this evening read a few chapters of the excellent "A Law of Her Own:
The Reasonable Woman As a Measure of Man", by Caroline A. Forell, Donna
Meredith Matthews. I think you'll agree with me that it's written with a
feminist voice. Page 72 starts its discussion on female-on-male harassment in
the workplace. They give the example of Richard Williams v. Runyon where
Williams' supervisor, Clora Grant, was the alleged harasser. The court decided
that it wasn't harassment. I read the court decision, and I agree with the
authors of "A Law of Her Own" - the court was wrong and it was clearly
harassment.

Which means I easily found an example of feminist legal scholarship which was
using the same definitional premise you quoted as applying to all feminists.

I assert that it's much more likely that that quote is wrong than that Forell
and Matthews do not understand feminism.

BTW, the interpretation of Title VII has changed since 1995. That's why now
there can be a decision like:

> DETROIT – LensCrafters, a major eyewear company, will pay $192,500 to settle
> a female-on-male sexual harassment lawsuit filed by the U.S. Equal
> Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), the agency announced today. The
> EEOC had charged that LensCrafters subjected a male employee to a sexually
> hostile work environment at its Saginaw, Mich., retail location.

> According to the EEOC’s suit (Civil Action No. 1:09-CV-12694, filed in U.S.
> District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan), LensCrafters violated
> Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 by subjecting a male lab
> technician to sexual harassment and failing to address his complaints that a
> female co-worker was abusing him. The EEOC said the harassment included the
> female employee touching the male and making inappropriate comments about
> his appearance. In its suit, the EEOC charged that LensCrafters fostered the
> hostile climate by disregarding the male technician’s complaints because he
> was a man.

~~~
Joeboy
It's certainly the case that many feminists do not apply the reasoning in the
FAQ. I should have been clearer that by "contemporary feminists" I meant
"adherents to more recent feminist thought" rather than "feminists who are
currently alive" ("third-wave feminists" was the context of the conversation).
The relevance is that one of the words in the draft Django code of conduct
means significantly different things to different people, which is undoubtedly
true, although I'm not particularly lobbying to change it.

~~~
dalke
Being "nice" and being "professional" also mean significantly different things
to different people, so it's not like that's the only word.

~~~
Joeboy
I don't think people would disagree about the _definitions_ of those words.

Edit: and, to be honest, I don't care that much. It is a fact that a
significant number of feminists hold that sexism can only be directed by men
towards women. That is really all I wanted to say. I don't particularly want
to argue about whether they're right, or what implications this has.

~~~
dalke
Fair enough. Most of my recent readings have been in the founding of civil
rights law in the 1960s, so pre-second wave(?). Problem is, I can't make that
fit into the 1st/2nd/3rd wave view.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second-wave_feminism> says the movement started
in the early 1960s, and that first wave ended when women were enfranchised in
the early 1900s.

But the Civil Rights act of 1963 had decades of work behind it. The National
Woman's Party, which was the militant branch of the Suffrage Movement, started
pushing for the Equal Rights Amendment in 1923 and "the Republican Party
endorsed the ERA in its 1940 platform, and the Democratic Party followed suit
in 1944." (Quoting from <http://www.jofreeman.com/lawandpolicy/titlevii.htm>
). The Equal Pay Act also has its roots in the 1800s.

It feels then like 40 years of work towards gender equality in the workplace -
including the inroads made during WWII by seeing that women can definitely
hold jobs in industry - are ignored by the three-wave view of history, and
that the successes of that ignored era are claimed solely as 2nd wave
victories.

In any case, that's neither here nor there. It's idle musing that I wrote down
so it's easier to come to mind next time I talk with someone who can tell me
about the history of feminism.

------
SPSteinbeck
Nice job wrapping a statement on ideological purity in niceties about being
"patient" and "friendly". I guess there is no escape from the long arm of the
diversity corps; in the schools, in the corporations and now in my web
application framework.

