[diversity] CoC Draft & Action Items

Hi,

The draft is waiting for me to merge some more suggested changes and fix some things raised in the thread.
If all goes well, I can wrap that up this week.
Based on the responses on the draft, we seem to mostly agree on it otherwise.

As Amanda said, there is still the question of the CoC team, which handles CoC incidents, and how they get a mandate. I have some rough thoughts on that.

As I’ve argued before, I think this role should not rest with the WG chairs or with the RIPE chair. The best option is likely a specific CoC team. Considering the structure of this community with a mix of online spaces and conferences, my first thought is one team, of which at least 4 people should be present and available at any RIPE meeting. Attending (all) RIPE meetings should not be a requirement, as RIPE meetings are not accessible to all, so it would be exclusionary. Having a single team helps some continuity, ongoing development, and consistency.
I’m not sure whether we should retain the trusted contacts as a separate team. I guess that could be very confusing.

The team needs to have an independent mandate, which includes measures like banning of a person from a conference, or terminating an ongoing talk.

Regarding who should be in it, I’m not sure how to work that out within the governance models of the RIPE community. In Django, the first CoC committee was formed ages ago, and mostly consisted of people involved in introducing the CoC at the time. The committee self-governs, asking for new volunteers when needed. The committee has a mandate from the board of the Django Software Foundation, and is also accountable to them. That board is in turn elected by the membership of that foundation. So in general there is self-management and delegation of mandate, but with accountability and reporting. The board can intervene if needed. I believe the Python Software Foundation has or is working on a similar model.

CoC team members also need to know what they’re getting into, and ensure they have sufficient availability. Especially on-site at a meeting, action may need to happen fast. Which means being reachable and able to change plans suddenly. Also, CoC work can be emotionally intense. Sometimes it’s really hard to decide whether it’s a violation and what should be done, sometimes incidents occur that are very serious and have a heavy impact. A lot of empathy work is involved. It also means your own behaviour is under the heaviest scrutiny of pretty much anyone at the conference, because as a team member you set the example of what is acceptable. This extends to every interaction related to the conference. It means you absolutely can not get a bit drunk at the party and blurt out a few sexist jokes - if we fail to set an example, the process falls apart (the #1 reason for me not to report incidents is because I don’t trust the response team). And, not everyone will like every decision you make, so especially team members from minority groups are at an increased risk of abusive behaviour from others. 

For training my first choice: https://otter.technology/code-of-conduct-training/ <https://otter.technology/code-of-conduct-training/>
I have not followed this training myself yet, but I have universally heard good things about it.
(And CoC team members should not be required to pay out of pocket for this, as that would be exclusionary.)

So, a big question is: within the processes of the RIPE community, how does a CoC response team get a mandate? To whom is it accountable and how? Can it self-manage members?
And also essential: we should prevent the CoC team from being dragged into months of discussion for every decision, just because one or two people who don’t like it stir up discussion on a mailing list - I do see this as a potential risk in the RIPE community due to its structure. Also, no process may depend on a single person.

(I will not be attending RIPE78 btw)

Sasha

> On 7 May 2019, at 15:00, Brian Nisbet <brian.nisbet at heanet.ie> wrote:
> 
> Folks,
> 
> I'm just wondering, where do we, collectively, believe the action item (or similar) lies at present with the draft for the new CoC.
> 
> From my reading there was an amount of feedback provided, but is the draft at a point where it can be officially shared with HPH, other stakeholders and the community, or is there more work to do? We have under two weeks before RIPE78 begins and I worry that we aren't in a good place to share our work (while absolutely noting that people might be waiting for me to do something?).
> 
> Thanks,
> 
> Brian
> 
> Brian Nisbet 
> Service Operations Manager
> HEAnet CLG, Ireland's National Education and Research Network
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