[address-policy-wg] cultural idioms in RIPE discussions

> On 1 Nov 2019, at 11:14, JORDI PALET MARTINEZ via address-policy-wg <address-policy-wg at ripe.net> wrote:
> 
> My point was also a general observation (not something against any specific participant, just taking advantage of this specific example, as a mention to "Spanish inquisition" and "routing police" could be interpreted in between lines as something different, even if not intended).

Jordi, your comment is a reasonable one. But it misses the point. In this case, your common sense should have told you the earlier remark wasn't a literal reference to the Spanish Inquisition.

The RIPE/tech community habitually uses references to a variety of idioms from popular culture in films, TV, books and songs. Using catchphrases from Monty Python, Star Wars, Star Trek, H2G2, etc. are very common. That's gone on for decades. These phrases might well confuse non-native English speakers at first. Or (say) an English speaker who haven't seen Star Wars. However people soon pick up these references, just like we all learn the industry jargon -- route flapping, prefix filtering, trust anchors, ROA, PI address space, etc -- that probably doesn't translate well into other languages. That sort of understanding becomes almost automatic for those who have been active in these communities for a while.

To be honest Jordi, I'm surprised you said you were confused. Since you've been coming to RIPE/IETF/ICANN meetings for longer than I can remember, this couldn't possibly have been the first time you've come across a Monty Python reference.

And if you were confused, you could have said so at the time and asked the original poster to explain. I think that's a far better way to handle things. It's certainly far more productive than starting this meta-discussion or telling others how they should express themselves.