[python-committers] Fw: CoC violation (was: Retire or reword the "Beautiful is better than ugly" Zen clause)

[Paul Moore]

On Thu, 20 Sep 2018 at 21:37, Antoine Pitrou <antoine at python.org> wrote:
>
>
> Apparently it's this one:
> https://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-ideas/2018-September/053482.html
>
> By the way, regardless of this single case, I would like people to think
> of the broader issue we're having.  It's more than a single contentious
> decision.

Before I say anything else, I want to point out that (a) I'm not
objecting to the ban, or the process that took place to impose it, and
(b) I'm extremely appreciative of the work our moderators put into
trying to police things in an increasingly difficult environment. So
please take anything I say in that context - as perspective from
someone who is concerned about the direction that certain of our
groups are taking, but understands that it's not an easy problem to
solve.

But in the interest of looking at the broader issue (which I agree
with Antoine is something we should be concerned about)...

I understand that the taboo in question is a strong one in American
culture, and as such violating that is inconsiderate and insensitive.
Doing so deliberately is both unacceptable, and a cheap form of debate
(if giving offense is the only way you have to make your point, maybe
your point's not good enough?) But it is still very much one culture's
position, and American sensibilities often seem to be very clear and
present in a lot of the debates we see that "get out of hand" in one
way or another. I'm British (and my age may also be relevant - I grew
up in the 1960s and 70s), and from my perspective, it feels like a lot
of people are over-sensitive, and very quick to perceive offense - to
the extent that entirely natural (to many British people) and accepted
tones, like sarcasm and irony, are almost impossible to express
without having to completely obscure meaning by adding clarifications
and explanations.

I'll also comment on the point made here, can anyone point to a
non-American taboo that has been violated and hasn't been dealt with
the same way? Not really, but in my case that's because I don't think
the British *have* strong taboos like that (and Antoine indicates that
the same is true of the French). The only thing I can think of is
religious taboos, such as Muslim concerns about taking the name of the
Prophet in vain, but I don't think I've ever seen that sort of
violation (and I would expect that to be dealt with just as swiftly).
Personally, as a Catholic, arguing religious taboos on a list about a
language based on Monty Python feels ironic anyway - but for the
record, please don't ban references to the Spanish Inquisition or the
Holy Grail on my account :-)

Openness needs to be a two way street, in my view. Certainly people
from cultures that have a more "robust" (shall we say) natural form of
expression need to be aware that other cultures and people may not be
able to deal with that - but conversely, people from cultures with a
strong sense of certain words and expressions being unacceptable need
to be open to the fact that others don't have that sense, and expect
thicker skins in debate. That's not how I see the Python community
going at the moment - rather we're moving towards a "lowest common
denominator" approach, where *everyone* needs to skirt around all
possible forms of offense, and the person claiming to be offended is
in effect always in the right. That, to me, is taking the easy option,
and I think that the Python community should aspire to do something
better than that, even if it's hard.

The internet in general is a hugely beneficial technology, allowing us
to interact with people in radically different cultures and situations
than we were ever able to in the past. That's a massive step forward
for humanity as a whole in understanding each other - and we shouldn't
undermine it by putting up barriers to communication in the form of
preventing people from making (and learning from) dumb social
mistakes.

As things stand, everyone is living in fear of giving offense. As an
example, some time ago, I was participating in a discussion where some
participant made a comment that I thought was a bit out of line with
the list's policy,. It didn't bother me, personally, at all (as I say,
I'm British :-)) but rather than let it lie, I felt that I should
mention this, rather than leave it to someone else. However, what
ended up happening was that I got a lot of criticism for "taking
offense unnecessarily". (I don't have a link, and I don't want to
provide one - it's an example, not something I feel the need to
analyze further). So rather than *helping*, I ended up being the bad
guy simply from trying to channel other people's views and getting it
wrong. And I ended up with a strong sense that everyone viewed me as
the sort of over-sensitive complainer that I try very, very hard not
to be.

When I write mails for the lists, it's an exhausting process. The
technical content is easy, but policing my own tone against an
increasingly complex and restrictive set of standards that I don't
personally subscribe to, nor do I really understand, is becoming a
burden that puts me off contributing. That is *not* to say that I have
any problem with the CoC - I certainly wouldn't consider myself to be
anything other than "Open, Considerate and Respectful" - but I
constantly feel that I have to word my contributions in a way that's
unnatural to me, simply because I have to take the view that people
reading my words have no sense of who I am, and cannot get any such
sense because if I were to "loosen up", there's too much of a risk
that someone would take offense. (As an example, people who know me in
real life would be used to me referring to things as "stupid" and
"idiotic" and wouldn't worry or take offense - because I call *myself*
"stupid" and "idiotic" far more often than I use the terms about
anything else - but how would I ever get to the point where I could do
that in a list conversation? So I have to find alternative words which
convey the same sense that I get when I say "stupid" - and that
basically means a 5 or 6 word phrase with a couple of footnotes saying
"no, I don't mean you personally" or similar. Which destroys the
readability of my comment. Much like my having to over-expand this
parenthetical note has done ;-))

We have to take care. There are no visual or body language cues when
writing emails. I'm not arguing that people should be given license to
say whatever they want. But nor should people be made to live in fear
of making a genuine mistake.

Paul