llvm dev - May 2016 - Resuming the discussion of establishing an LLVM code of conduct

On 5 May 2016, at 12:14, Charles Davis via llvm-dev <llvm-dev at
lists.llvm.org> wrote:
> 
> The last sentence of the third paragraph bothers me:
> 
>> In addition, violations of this code outside these spaces may affect
>> a person's ability to participate within them.
> ​This essentially gives the committee carte blanche to police our thoughts
no matter where we are or what we're doing. I don't like the idea of
having my thoughts policed. There are people out there who will abuse ​this for
their own ends! I can't let those people do that.
Something like this is required, based on real problems that have existed in
some other communities.  If one LLVM contributor is attacking another on
Facebook / Twitter / whatever, then it’s not acceptable for the LLVM community
to simply say ‘it’s not on our mailing lists, it’s not our problem’.

Similarly, it’s hard to claim that a project is inclusive of group X if
committer Y is attacking group X elsewhere in a way that associates the project
with their statements (for example, soliciting LLVM-related consulting work from
the same account) and the project is happy to permit this.

These are not hypothetical problems, they are ones that I have first-hand
experience with (though, thankfully, not in this community).  The code of
conduct does need to provide a mechanism for addressing these, though the
sanctions that can be employed (removal of commit rights, removal of mailing
list access) are fairly mild.  We don’t want to be in a situation where people
can say ‘don’t get involved with LLVM, they hate people like you’ and we say
‘oh, that’s just an LLVM developer posting on his own site / social media
thingy, it’s nothing to do with us.  [S]He’s never used LLVM infrastructure to
harass people like you, so it’s not our problem’.

David

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On 5 May 2016 at 12:32, David Chisnall via llvm-dev
<llvm-dev at lists.llvm.org> wrote:
> Something like this is required, based on real problems that have existed
in some other communities.  If one LLVM contributor is attacking another on
Facebook / Twitter / whatever, then it’s not acceptable for the LLVM community
to simply say ‘it’s not on our mailing lists, it’s not our problem’.
>
> Similarly, it’s hard to claim that a project is inclusive of group X if
committer Y is attacking group X elsewhere in a way that associates the project
with their statements (for example, soliciting LLVM-related consulting work from
the same account) and the project is happy to permit this.
Let me get this straight... An example, if you allow me:

I'm against the ownership of firearms, and go at great lengths and
poorly choosing words in a discussion, which some could consider rude,
with person X about it. I know person X for decades and have earned
the right to offend him/her personally as they know I don't mean it
(could be a joke, and internal one even). This is a very strong
cultural point in many countries, including Brazil. The stronger two
people can offend each other and shrug, the stronger their bond is.

Completely unrelated, person Y subscribes to my posts on G+, and he is
pro-guns decide he's threatened by my strong opinions, and poor choice
of words on a completely separate forum. He then decides to ask the
committee to block me from the LLVM list on those merits.

This sounds utterly ridiculous to me, but the phrase, as it is, would
allow person Y to do that, and the committee to block me.

> These are not hypothetical problems, they are ones that I have first-hand
experience with (though, thankfully, not in this community).  The code of
conduct does need to provide a mechanism for addressing these, though the
sanctions that can be employed (removal of commit rights, removal of mailing
list access) are fairly mild.
In its current form, that phrase allows the exact same sanctions as
all the other issues.

> We don’t want to be in a situation where people can say ‘don’t get involved
with LLVM, they hate people like you’
Judging the group by the behaviour of one person outside of the group
is not just generalisation, but prejudice, and the very thing the code
of conduct is trying to curb. Wouldn't this person be better off our
community in the first place?

cheers,
--renato

On 5 May 2016 at 12:42, Renato Golin <renato.golin at linaro.org>
wrote:
> I'm against the ownership of firearms, and go at great lengths and
> poorly choosing words in a discussion, which some could consider rude,
> with person X about it. I know person X for decades and have earned
> the right to offend him/her personally as they know I don't mean it
> (could be a joke, and internal one even). This is a very strong
> cultural point in many countries, including Brazil. The stronger two
> people can offend each other and shrug, the stronger their bond is.
Just for the sake of completeness, there are four main cases:

1. I interact with X outside LLVM, Y gets offended. The code has no
part in this whatsoever.

2. I interact with Y outside LLVM, Y gets offended. The code has no
part in this whatsoever.

3. I interact with Y outside LLVM, *about* their ability to perform as
an LLVM developer, Y gets offended. The code *may* have something to
do about it, but as you say, the sanctions *have* to be *way* less
serious.

4. I interact with Y inside LLVM, Y gets offended. That's what the
code is all about.

Makes sense?

--renato

> On 5 May 2016, at 12:42, Renato Golin <renato.golin at linaro.org>
wrote:
> 
> On 5 May 2016 at 12:32, David Chisnall via llvm-dev
> <llvm-dev at lists.llvm.org> wrote:
>> Something like this is required, based on real problems that have
existed in some other communities.  If one LLVM contributor is attacking another
on Facebook / Twitter / whatever, then it’s not acceptable for the LLVM
community to simply say ‘it’s not on our mailing lists, it’s not our problem’.
>> 
>> Similarly, it’s hard to claim that a project is inclusive of group X if
committer Y is attacking group X elsewhere in a way that associates the project
with their statements (for example, soliciting LLVM-related consulting work from
the same account) and the project is happy to permit this.
> 
> Let me get this straight... An example, if you allow me:
> 
> I'm against the ownership of firearms, and go at great lengths and
> poorly choosing words in a discussion, which some could consider rude,
> with person X about it. I know person X for decades and have earned
> the right to offend him/her personally as they know I don't mean it
> (could be a joke, and internal one even). This is a very strong
> cultural point in many countries, including Brazil. The stronger two
> people can offend each other and shrug, the stronger their bond is.
> 
> Completely unrelated, person Y subscribes to my posts on G+, and he is
> pro-guns decide he's threatened by my strong opinions, and poor choice
> of words on a completely separate forum. He then decides to ask the
> committee to block me from the LLVM list on those merits.
> 
> This sounds utterly ridiculous to me, but the phrase, as it is, would
> allow person Y to do that, and the committee to block me.
You’re conflating opinions about things with opinions about people (so is the
current CoC, which is why the wording needs to be improved - a point that I
think that we both strongly agree on).  In the case of your example, if a person
is going to be offended by opinions unrelated to either themselves or the
subject at hand, then I’d agree that they are no great loss to the community.

Now let’s restructure your example a bit:

Developer X thinks that Brazilians are idiots and only ever get technical jobs
because of nepotism.  He’s perfectly civil to you on the LLVM lists, but then in
the evenings posts on G+ with these opinions.  These posts talk about how hard
it is for him to have to work with Brazilians, because they’re just not up to
his mental level.

Now, you’ve got a pretty thick skin and I’d imagine that you’d decide that he’s
an idiot that whose negative opinion of you is worth as much as a positive
opinion from some other people.  But if some other Brazilians come to LLVM, see
his name on the mailing lists, and from this find his G+ account, do you think
that they’re going to perceive LLVM as a community that will welcome them?

Replace Brazilians with women or some other minority group in the above example.
Would you want to be a member of a community that was happy to silently endorse
these opinions?
>> These are not hypothetical problems, they are ones that I have
first-hand experience with (though, thankfully, not in this community).  The
code of conduct does need to provide a mechanism for addressing these, though
the sanctions that can be employed (removal of commit rights, removal of mailing
list access) are fairly mild.
> 
> In its current form, that phrase allows the exact same sanctions as
> all the other issues.
Which are pretty minor.  The LLVM project doesn’t give access to much useful
infrastructure to community members.
>> We don’t want to be in a situation where people can say ‘don’t get
involved with LLVM, they hate people like you’
> 
> Judging the group by the behaviour of one person outside of the group
> is not just generalisation, but prejudice, and the very thing the code
> of conduct is trying to curb. Wouldn't this person be better off our
> community in the first place?
Do you stop being a member of the LLVM community as soon as you stop posting on
the mailing lists?  Judging a community by the actions of its members is what
humans do.

David

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On Thu, May 5, 2016 at 4:32 AM David Chisnall <David.Chisnall at
cl.cam.ac.uk>
wrote:
> On 5 May 2016, at 12:14, Charles Davis via llvm-dev <
> llvm-dev at lists.llvm.org> wrote:
> >
> > The last sentence of the third paragraph bothers me:
> >
> >> In addition, violations of this code outside these spaces may
affect
> >> a person's ability to participate within them.
> > ​This essentially gives the committee carte blanche to police our
> thoughts no matter where we are or what we're doing. I don't like
the idea
> of having my thoughts policed. There are people out there who will abuse
> ​this for their own ends! I can't let those people do that.
>
> Something like this is required, based on real problems that have existed
> in some other communities.  If one LLVM contributor is attacking another on
> Facebook / Twitter / whatever, then it’s not acceptable for the LLVM
> community to simply say ‘it’s not on our mailing lists, it’s not our
> problem’.
>
Agreed.

I'm sorry that this probably means that Charles and I have an
irreconcilable difference of perspective and opinion here, but I think this
is necessary.

I would also expect any group selected to help respond to violations to be
reasonable about this. While any system can be abused (including the
current system!) we can call that abuse out and stop it. Personally, I have
a tremendous amount of trust in the LLVM community to enforce these things
in a productive and not malicious or subversive way.
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