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[diversity] RIPE Code of Conduct 2.0
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Daniel Karrenberg
dfk at ripe.net
Wed Jun 5 10:34:58 CEST 2019
Summary: - It is good that the draft gives examples of unacceptable behavior. - It is a real bad idea to create a special enforcement committee. - The draft should encourage anyone in the community to actively intervene when they observe unacceptable behavior. - It would be better to continue the current system of trusted contacts and empower them more. -------- Full disclosure: I have participated in RIPE for 30 years and attended 76 RIPE meetings as well as numerous other meetings organised by our community. During these 30 years there were some times when I have not behaved in an exemplary manner; a few of those times I would have run afoul of this draft code of conduct. With the help of people from this community I have been able to realise my behavior was not appropriate, to apologise and to make amends. Despite these missteps I feel that I have contributed positively to the development and success of the RIPE community. I have also experienced some inappropriate behavior towards myself over the years and dealt with it appropriately, again with the help of people from this community. I welcome the part of this draft that describes examples of inappropriate behavior and states clearly that we as a community do not tolerate it. This is an improvement over the current code. I am very deeply concerned about the part of this draft that creates a very vaguely described 'enforcement committee' without any responsibility to anyone and without any process whatsoever. Adopting this part of the code would be a disaster for the credibility and standing of RIPE all by itself but even more so by inviting our antagonists to use it as a vehicle to harm us. RIPE is not a conference but a community that with a significant governance aspect. We argue in favor of our self governance by pointing to RIPE, its openness and its low threshold to participation. This requires that anyone interested can participate meaningfully in RIPE. Excluding people from RIPE will be very bad; doing so without a clear process and a hearing will be a disaster! We should remove this language from the draft completely. Instead, I suggest to a call on everyone in the community to actively intervene when they observe inappropriate behavior and to help all parties concerned to resolve the situation. The language should make it clear that such interventions are positive and welcomed by the RIPE community. I realise that it requires courage to act. We should encourage people and not give them further excuse to look away by putting emphasis only on a specific formal mechanism. I suggest to maintain the current system of trusted contacts for reporting violations and add that staff and volunteers such as chairs and PC are also available. Where, by the way, is the evidence that this is not sufficient? Maybe the trusted contacts can provide some sort of transparency report to us? Further I recommend to develop a response plan that defines who is responsible to take action in cases where individuals do not stop inappropriate behavior once it is pointed out to them. These responsibilities do exist today within our governance structure. They are shared between RIPE, RIPE NCC and third parties such as the owners/operators of our venues. Maybe this needs to be clarified and we may need to establish roles within these structures that are responsible to follow up on any actions. But let us not create a new committee whose sole purpose is to sanction community members without any process! Before we know it this will lead its own life. We should also make it clear that we do not tolerate any abuse of the code of conduct itself. I realise that can be interpreted as off-putting. However it is an essential part of such a code. In case the TF wishes to act on my suggestions regarding the draft, I am very much willing to help with creating new text. Sincerely! Daniel
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