Experiences from the Django community
Hi everyone, I’m delighted to see that the RIPE community is taking important steps to improve diversity and inclusivity. As some of you might remember, I worked for RIPE NCC until 2011 and attended most RIPE meetings back then, though none since. Since then I’ve been doing a lot of volunteer work around diversity and inclusivity, in particular in the Django community. Django is the most popular web framework for Python, developed as an open source project for the last 12 years. In recent times, the Django (and to a different extent, Python) community has made large steps in diversity and inclusivity. It is not uncommon for Django conferences to have an approximate 50/50 split between men and women on stage, even though talk selection is usually blind (i.e. without information identifying the speaker). There is much work left to do though. I felt there may be resources, experiences and best practices that can be helpful for this group too, so I laid out a few things below. (I couldn’t reply to the existing thread, as I only just joined the list.) A fundament is that the Django community and events have a Code of Conduct[2] with a strong process behind it, including things like tracking repeat offenders and (limited) sharing of information between conferences. I recently became a member of the CoC committee that manages part of this. For example, prior to accepting speakers, conferences often send their list of names so the committee can compare that to their list of past incidents. In the interest of transparency, the enforcement manual[3] along with most internal documentation[4] is public. A CoC with a proper process is only a first step. Other efforts in the Django community include extensive outreach to marginalised groups, offering speaker mentors, financial aid programs, ensuring people moderate their alcohol consumption, accessibility information, live transcription, quiet rooms, childcare, and so on. As a side project, I maintain the Less Obvious Conference Checklist[1] which has a lot suggestions of this kind for conferences - most easy, some very hard - many of which can make an impact on inclusivity. Some of the lessons I learned along the way that I thought may be relevant, reading your other discussions: - D&I is more than “at this conference we claim you won’t be harassed or assaulted, or we will take action if it happens”. For many marginalised groups, experiences in tech and tech communities are so poor, that it requires building a lot more trust in that a community is actually doing better in being a nice and safe place, and not just saying so. Personally, I think building this trust is the single hardest issue. - Related to this, if people aren’t reporting incidents under your CoC, it doesn’t mean they didn’t happen. People (including me) can be very reluctant to report, and if they don’t trust the process enough might just end up leaving and telling their friends to stay away. In Django events, we’ve noticed a small increase in minor incident reports - not because more are happening, but because we’ve built enough trust that people report them. - Statistics can be helpful, for example in tracking whether there is progress compared to before. They can also give an indication of whether things you’ve done seem effective. However, I’m skeptic of having direct numbers as single absolute goals. On the other hand, you can probably say that if 2% of speakers are women, something isn’t going right somewhere. On intersectionality: any D&I initiative that wants to stay away from the complexity of intersectionality is dead in the water, as is an initiative that wants to treat everyone equal. My position, even being part of some marginalised groups, and my ability to participate in a community and attend events, is incomparably privileged compared to (for example, on average) a trans woman of colour or someone with housing or income insecurity. We can not treat everyone the same, because we are doing this in a society where marginalised groups and many others are already not treated equal or provided equal opportunities. And simplifying efforts to “sex discrimination” is simply way too narrow. I hope that some of this was useful input. I also do a talk at a number of conferences on empathy in tech, which touches upon D&I and how experiences from marginalised people can be so different, and why this matters so much, among other things. A video should be out soon. In August I’ll be doing a talk at DjangoCon US about the Django CoC, the processes behind it and some of the myths, which might be interesting to this group too. Erik PS: Could someone update the XX/XY labeling on the attendee gender graphs on RIPE labs[5]? Guessing gender from names is hard and inaccurate already, but sometimes all we have and I understand that. However, unless you have an algorithm that actually guesses their chromosomes, labeling the groups as XX and XY is wrong and completely erases transgender people. [1] https://github.com/erikr/lessobviouschecklist [2] https://djangoproject.com/conduct/ [3] https://www.djangoproject.com/conduct/enforcement-manual/ [4] https://github.com/django/code-of-conduct [5] https://labs.ripe.net/Members/agowland/diversity-discussions-at-ripe-74
Erik, This is really interesting, thank you! Two points. I wouldn't say that simple numbers (50% of attendees) form a single, absolute goal. I think it is a goal, but there are many others along the way and, of course, there will be others after it as well. On the labelling on the RIPE Labs article, that's a very good point as well. I think it would be great if it could be corrected. Lots of input for our thinking and our progress! Thanks again, Brian Brian Nisbet Network Operations Manager HEAnet CLG, Ireland's National Education and Research Network 1st Floor, 5 George's Dock, IFSC, Dublin D01 X8N7, Ireland +35316609040 brian.nisbet@heanet.ie www.heanet.ie Registered in Ireland, No. 275301. CRA No. 20036270 On 12/07/2017 13:24, Erik Romijn wrote:
Hi everyone,
I’m delighted to see that the RIPE community is taking important steps to improve diversity and inclusivity. As some of you might remember, I worked for RIPE NCC until 2011 and attended most RIPE meetings back then, though none since.
Since then I’ve been doing a lot of volunteer work around diversity and inclusivity, in particular in the Django community. Django is the most popular web framework for Python, developed as an open source project for the last 12 years. In recent times, the Django (and to a different extent, Python) community has made large steps in diversity and inclusivity. It is not uncommon for Django conferences to have an approximate 50/50 split between men and women on stage, even though talk selection is usually blind (i.e. without information identifying the speaker). There is much work left to do though.
I felt there may be resources, experiences and best practices that can be helpful for this group too, so I laid out a few things below. (I couldn’t reply to the existing thread, as I only just joined the list.)
A fundament is that the Django community and events have a Code of Conduct[2] with a strong process behind it, including things like tracking repeat offenders and (limited) sharing of information between conferences. I recently became a member of the CoC committee that manages part of this. For example, prior to accepting speakers, conferences often send their list of names so the committee can compare that to their list of past incidents. In the interest of transparency, the enforcement manual[3] along with most internal documentation[4] is public.
A CoC with a proper process is only a first step. Other efforts in the Django community include extensive outreach to marginalised groups, offering speaker mentors, financial aid programs, ensuring people moderate their alcohol consumption, accessibility information, live transcription, quiet rooms, childcare, and so on. As a side project, I maintain the Less Obvious Conference Checklist[1] which has a lot suggestions of this kind for conferences - most easy, some very hard - many of which can make an impact on inclusivity.
Some of the lessons I learned along the way that I thought may be relevant, reading your other discussions:
- D&I is more than “at this conference we claim you won’t be harassed or assaulted, or we will take action if it happens”. For many marginalised groups, experiences in tech and tech communities are so poor, that it requires building a lot more trust in that a community is actually doing better in being a nice and safe place, and not just saying so. Personally, I think building this trust is the single hardest issue.
- Related to this, if people aren’t reporting incidents under your CoC, it doesn’t mean they didn’t happen. People (including me) can be very reluctant to report, and if they don’t trust the process enough might just end up leaving and telling their friends to stay away. In Django events, we’ve noticed a small increase in minor incident reports - not because more are happening, but because we’ve built enough trust that people report them.
- Statistics can be helpful, for example in tracking whether there is progress compared to before. They can also give an indication of whether things you’ve done seem effective. However, I’m skeptic of having direct numbers as single absolute goals. On the other hand, you can probably say that if 2% of speakers are women, something isn’t going right somewhere.
On intersectionality: any D&I initiative that wants to stay away from the complexity of intersectionality is dead in the water, as is an initiative that wants to treat everyone equal. My position, even being part of some marginalised groups, and my ability to participate in a community and attend events, is incomparably privileged compared to (for example, on average) a trans woman of colour or someone with housing or income insecurity. We can not treat everyone the same, because we are doing this in a society where marginalised groups and many others are already not treated equal or provided equal opportunities. And simplifying efforts to “sex discrimination” is simply way too narrow.
I hope that some of this was useful input. I also do a talk at a number of conferences on empathy in tech, which touches upon D&I and how experiences from marginalised people can be so different, and why this matters so much, among other things. A video should be out soon. In August I’ll be doing a talk at DjangoCon US about the Django CoC, the processes behind it and some of the myths, which might be interesting to this group too.
Erik
PS: Could someone update the XX/XY labeling on the attendee gender graphs on RIPE labs[5]? Guessing gender from names is hard and inaccurate already, but sometimes all we have and I understand that. However, unless you have an algorithm that actually guesses their chromosomes, labeling the groups as XX and XY is wrong and completely erases transgender people.
[1] https://github.com/erikr/lessobviouschecklist [2] https://djangoproject.com/conduct/ [3] https://www.djangoproject.com/conduct/enforcement-manual/ [4] https://github.com/django/code-of-conduct [5] https://labs.ripe.net/Members/agowland/diversity-discussions-at-ripe-74 _______________________________________________ Diversity mailing list Diversity@ripe.net https://lists.ripe.net/mailman/listinfo/diversity
Dear Eric, thank you very much for your contribution - it's an inspiration to me! I think RIPE community can learn a lot form other similar technical communities, such as Django / Python, so it's great that you reached out and shared your experiences & efforts! On 12/07/17 14:24, Erik Romijn wrote:
I also do a talk at a number of conferences on empathy in tech,
This topic is very interesting, I saw several such presentations on-line, and I would love it if you can submit your talk to the PC of RIPE meetings.
PS: Could someone update the XX/XY labeling on the attendee gender graphs on RIPE labs[5]? [5] https://labs.ripe.net/Members/agowland/diversity-discussions-at-ripe-74
Done! (I copied the graph from the previous/orignal article by Shane) Regards, Vesna
Hi Vesna and Leslie, On 13 Jul 2017, at 16:27, Vesna Manojlovic <BECHA@ripe.net> wrote:
I think RIPE community can learn a lot form other similar technical communities, such as Django / Python, so it's great that you reached out and shared your experiences & efforts!
Glad to help!
This topic is very interesting, I saw several such presentations on-line, and I would love it if you can submit your talk to the PC of RIPE meetings.
That sounds interesting. There are a few questions, but I’ll take those offline.
Done! (I copied the graph from the previous/orignal article by Shane)
Thanks! On 13 Jul 2017, at 17:24, Leslie <geekgirl@gmail.com> wrote:
Have you seen RIPE's Code of Conduct? I'm very proud that we print it on our badges! https://ripe74.ripe.net/on-site/code-of-conduct/ We also have one for the mailing lists - https://www.ripe.net/participate/mail/ripe-mailing-list-ripe-forum-code-of-c...
Yes, I think it’s a great step. I feel like there may be room for improvement, but I don’t have coherent thoughts on that right now. But this is already a great start.
Thanks! We are definitely looking into childcare for RIPE76 to see how that works. We're also hoping to start a mentor program for new folks, and I know that we could use help with that, if you're up for it!
A mentor program could probably be helpful, particularly as people from marginalised groups can more often feel less confident about their speaking abilities, or whether what they have to say is interesting. Mentoring can help them get over that barrier. I haven’t run any mentoring programs myself, so I’m not sure how much I could directly contribute. My friend Anna Ossowski did recently do a talk on mentoring that could be helpful: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=msMp8a0Dv3Q
I would be interested! Is that a talk you might be interested in giving at RIPE, about your experience with Django and how it might apply to other communities? (Putting on my programme committee hat)
I’m generally interested, but let’s take this one offline. Erik
Dear Erik, Thank you for that information. It's important to learn from other communities, including where they went wrong so we can avoid their mistakes. I saw that the "less obvious" checklist your cited linked to this tweet of a poster at Django. https://twitter.com/rixxtr/status/715558514631041025 Was action taken against the creator of the poster on the left for breach of the Code of Conduct? What kind of action was taken?
A fundament is that the Django community and events have a Code of Conduct[2] with a strong process behind it, including things like tracking repeat offenders and (limited) sharing of information between conferences.
I agree that having a strong process behind any Code of Conduct is fundamental. I have a couple of questions about Django's process: If the CARE committee maintains a "blacklist" of "repeat offenders", is this public? Are people on the list informed that they're on it, why, and what it says about them? Do Django participants have any right to challenge, appeal, or even be heard on the subject of accusations against them? How does that process work? Or is the CARE committee's decision final? Malcolm. -- Malcolm Hutty | tel: +44 20 7645 3523 Head of Public Affairs | Read the LINX Public Affairs blog London Internet Exchange | http://publicaffairs.linx.net/ London Internet Exchange Ltd Monument Place, 24 Monument Street London EC3R 8AJ Company Registered in England No. 3137929 Trinity Court, Trinity Street, Peterborough PE1 1DA
Hello Malcolm, On 13 Jul 2017, at 17:06, Malcolm Hutty <malcolm@linx.net> wrote:
I saw that the "less obvious" checklist your cited linked to this tweet of a poster at Django. https://twitter.com/rixxtr/status/715558514631041025
Was action taken against the creator of the poster on the left for breach of the Code of Conduct? What kind of action was taken?
I’m not sure in which way you believe the poster on the left violated the CoC. As far as I know, no reports were made to the CoC team of that conference about this poster, and to my knowledge no action was taken.
If the CARE committee maintains a "blacklist" of "repeat offenders", is this public? Are people on the list informed that they're on it, why, and what it says about them?
So, there’s two important things to distinguish in the Django community: The CARE team is composed of local conference organisers, and not under direct supervision from anywhere else. Not all conferences call their CoC team “CARE” - but let’s stick with that term for now for simplicity. The only absolute requirement is that if the name of an event uses the Django trademark, they are required to have a CoC. In addition, there is the Django Software Foundation, which holds the Django trademark and receives and provides sponsorship, amongst other things. The DSF has a Code of Conduct committee, which deals with CoC reports in the wider community, such as mailing lists. The committee can also provide support and advice. CoC incidents at conferences are primarily handled by the local CARE team, though they may ask the CoC committee for input. The CARE team makes their own decisions on how to handle an incident. The CARE team is encouraged, but not required, to send a report of encountered incidents and the measures they took to the CoC committee. The committee will assess whether they believe further action is needed, though usually it’s not, and record the incident. If an incident is reported to the CoC committee directly, they follow the enforcement manual to come to a decision, and record the incident. The record of incidents is not public. When someone who violated the CoC is spoken to, they should be informed that the incident will be reported and kept on record. Records for almost all incidents have an expunging date, except of course lifetime bans, which are extremely rare. Having been involved in an incident also almost never bans someone from the community, so it’s not a blacklist - these people are still welcome to participate. However, when a conference submits their list of speakers, we might say “we recommend that you have an extra talk with this person about X”. Even this is rare though.
Do Django participants have any right to challenge, appeal, or even be heard on the subject of accusations against them? How does that process work? Or is the CARE committee's decision final?
For decisions of a CARE team, there is generally no formal challenge process, as the team doesn’t directly answer to anyone else - it’s their event. However, someone could escalate an issue to the CoC committee, and although we have no formal power, I imagine the DSF and the community can put pressure on the organisers. It rather depends on the exact circumstances though. People disagreeing with decisions is very rare though. It’s also important to keep in mind that a lot of incidents and resolutions are minor. Most enforcement consists of telling someone “hey, we were told that you did that, we have a CoC, it’s not ok, and this is why” - and they say “yes, I did that, sorry, I didn’t realise, won’t happen again”. For decisions of the CoC committee, there is an option to request reconsideration by the DSF board. Any directly affected party can ask for this - to my knowledge this has never actually happened. I do want to stress that I am speaking from my own perspective, and none of this is necessarily the formal opinion of the DSF or the CoC committee. Also, the CoC and it’s surrounding processes are far from perfect. From time to time we discover ways in which we could do better, or be clearer, and make amendments to the way we work. I’m sure this will continue for quite some time. For example, we recently clarified our reporting guide: https://github.com/django/djangoproject.com/pull/757/files Erik
Hello Malcolm, On 13 Jul 2017, at 21:43, Erik Romijn <erik@erik.io> wrote:
On 13 Jul 2017, at 17:06, Malcolm Hutty <malcolm@linx.net> wrote:
I saw that the "less obvious" checklist your cited linked to this tweet of a poster at Django. https://twitter.com/rixxtr/status/715558514631041025
Was action taken against the creator of the poster on the left for breach of the Code of Conduct? What kind of action was taken?
I’m not sure in which way you believe the poster on the left violated the CoC. As far as I know, no reports were made to the CoC team of that conference about this poster, and to my knowledge no action was taken.
I would still be very interested to know why you believe that poster violated the CoC. Especially because perhaps there’s an opportunity for us there to improve the CoC or processes surrounding it. Erik
Hi Malcolm, On 23 Jul 2017, at 13:32, Erik Romijn <erik@erik.io> wrote:
On 13 Jul 2017, at 21:43, Erik Romijn <erik@erik.io> wrote:
On 13 Jul 2017, at 17:06, Malcolm Hutty <malcolm@linx.net> wrote:
I saw that the "less obvious" checklist your cited linked to this tweet of a poster at Django. https://twitter.com/rixxtr/status/715558514631041025
Was action taken against the creator of the poster on the left for breach of the Code of Conduct? What kind of action was taken?
I’m not sure in which way you believe the poster on the left violated the CoC. As far as I know, no reports were made to the CoC team of that conference about this poster, and to my knowledge no action was taken.
I would still be very interested to know why you believe that poster violated the CoC. Especially because perhaps there’s an opportunity for us there to improve the CoC or processes surrounding it.
I’m disappointed to see you didn’t respond to this at all anymore. Have you lost interest in this issue? I take all allegations of a CoC violation at my events very seriously - hence my eagerness in clarification on this issue. Sasha
On Wed, Jul 12, 2017 at 5:24 AM, Erik Romijn <erik@erik.io> wrote:
Hi everyone,
I’m delighted to see that the RIPE community is taking important steps to improve diversity and inclusivity. As some of you might remember, I worked for RIPE NCC until 2011 and attended most RIPE meetings back then, though none since.
Since then I’ve been doing a lot of volunteer work around diversity and inclusivity, in particular in the Django community. Django is the most popular web framework for Python, developed as an open source project for the last 12 years. In recent times, the Django (and to a different extent, Python) community has made large steps in diversity and inclusivity. It is not uncommon for Django conferences to have an approximate 50/50 split between men and women on stage, even though talk selection is usually blind (i.e. without information identifying the speaker). There is much work left to do though.
I felt there may be resources, experiences and best practices that can be helpful for this group too, so I laid out a few things below. (I couldn’t reply to the existing thread, as I only just joined the list.)
A fundament is that the Django community and events have a Code of Conduct[2] with a strong process behind it, including things like tracking repeat offenders and (limited) sharing of information between conferences. I recently became a member of the CoC committee that manages part of this. For example, prior to accepting speakers, conferences often send their list of names so the committee can compare that to their list of past incidents. In the interest of transparency, the enforcement manual[3] along with most internal documentation[4] is public.
Have you seen RIPE's Code of Conduct? I'm very proud that we print it on our badges! https://ripe74.ripe.net/on-site/code-of-conduct/ We also have one for the mailing lists - https://www.ripe.net/participate/mail/ripe-mailing-list-ripe-forum-code-of-c...
A CoC with a proper process is only a first step. Other efforts in the Django community include extensive outreach to marginalised groups, offering speaker mentors, financial aid programs, ensuring people moderate their alcohol consumption, accessibility information, live transcription, quiet rooms, childcare, and so on. As a side project, I maintain the Less Obvious Conference Checklist[1] which has a lot suggestions of this kind for conferences - most easy, some very hard - many of which can make an impact on inclusivity.
Thanks! We are definitely looking into childcare for RIPE76 to see how that works. We're also hoping to start a mentor program for new folks, and I know that we could use help with that, if you're up for it!
Some of the lessons I learned along the way that I thought may be relevant, reading your other discussions:
- D&I is more than “at this conference we claim you won’t be harassed or assaulted, or we will take action if it happens”. For many marginalised groups, experiences in tech and tech communities are so poor, that it requires building a lot more trust in that a community is actually doing better in being a nice and safe place, and not just saying so. Personally, I think building this trust is the single hardest issue.
- Related to this, if people aren’t reporting incidents under your CoC, it doesn’t mean they didn’t happen. People (including me) can be very reluctant to report, and if they don’t trust the process enough might just end up leaving and telling their friends to stay away. In Django events, we’ve noticed a small increase in minor incident reports - not because more are happening, but because we’ve built enough trust that people report them.
- Statistics can be helpful, for example in tracking whether there is progress compared to before. They can also give an indication of whether things you’ve done seem effective. However, I’m skeptic of having direct numbers as single absolute goals. On the other hand, you can probably say that if 2% of speakers are women, something isn’t going right somewhere.
On intersectionality: any D&I initiative that wants to stay away from the complexity of intersectionality is dead in the water, as is an initiative that wants to treat everyone equal. My position, even being part of some marginalised groups, and my ability to participate in a community and attend events, is incomparably privileged compared to (for example, on average) a trans woman of colour or someone with housing or income insecurity. We can not treat everyone the same, because we are doing this in a society where marginalised groups and many others are already not treated equal or provided equal opportunities. And simplifying efforts to “sex discrimination” is simply way too narrow.
I hope that some of this was useful input. I also do a talk at a number of conferences on empathy in tech, which touches upon D&I and how experiences from marginalised people can be so different, and why this matters so much, among other things. A video should be out soon. In August I’ll be doing a talk at DjangoCon US about the Django CoC, the processes behind it and some of the myths, which might be interesting to this group too.
I would be interested! Is that a talk you might be interested in giving at RIPE, about your experience with Django and how it might apply to other communities? (Putting on my programme committee hat) Leslie
Erik
PS: Could someone update the XX/XY labeling on the attendee gender graphs on RIPE labs[5]? Guessing gender from names is hard and inaccurate already, but sometimes all we have and I understand that. However, unless you have an algorithm that actually guesses their chromosomes, labeling the groups as XX and XY is wrong and completely erases transgender people.
[1] https://github.com/erikr/lessobviouschecklist [2] https://djangoproject.com/conduct/ [3] https://www.djangoproject.com/conduct/enforcement-manual/ [4] https://github.com/django/code-of-conduct [5] https://labs.ripe.net/Members/agowland/diversity-discussions-at-ripe-74 _______________________________________________ Diversity mailing list Diversity@ripe.net https://lists.ripe.net/mailman/listinfo/diversity
OH and thank you so much for pointing out the XX/XY axis labeling! On Thu, Jul 13, 2017 at 8:24 AM, Leslie <geekgirl@gmail.com> wrote:
On Wed, Jul 12, 2017 at 5:24 AM, Erik Romijn <erik@erik.io> wrote:
Hi everyone,
I’m delighted to see that the RIPE community is taking important steps to improve diversity and inclusivity. As some of you might remember, I worked for RIPE NCC until 2011 and attended most RIPE meetings back then, though none since.
Since then I’ve been doing a lot of volunteer work around diversity and inclusivity, in particular in the Django community. Django is the most popular web framework for Python, developed as an open source project for the last 12 years. In recent times, the Django (and to a different extent, Python) community has made large steps in diversity and inclusivity. It is not uncommon for Django conferences to have an approximate 50/50 split between men and women on stage, even though talk selection is usually blind (i.e. without information identifying the speaker). There is much work left to do though.
I felt there may be resources, experiences and best practices that can be helpful for this group too, so I laid out a few things below. (I couldn’t reply to the existing thread, as I only just joined the list.)
A fundament is that the Django community and events have a Code of Conduct[2] with a strong process behind it, including things like tracking repeat offenders and (limited) sharing of information between conferences. I recently became a member of the CoC committee that manages part of this. For example, prior to accepting speakers, conferences often send their list of names so the committee can compare that to their list of past incidents. In the interest of transparency, the enforcement manual[3] along with most internal documentation[4] is public.
Have you seen RIPE's Code of Conduct? I'm very proud that we print it on our badges! https://ripe74.ripe.net/on-site/code-of-conduct/ We also have one for the mailing lists - https://www.ripe.net/participate/mail/ripe-mailing-list-ripe-forum-code-of-c...
A CoC with a proper process is only a first step. Other efforts in the Django community include extensive outreach to marginalised groups, offering speaker mentors, financial aid programs, ensuring people moderate their alcohol consumption, accessibility information, live transcription, quiet rooms, childcare, and so on. As a side project, I maintain the Less Obvious Conference Checklist[1] which has a lot suggestions of this kind for conferences - most easy, some very hard - many of which can make an impact on inclusivity.
Thanks! We are definitely looking into childcare for RIPE76 to see how that works. We're also hoping to start a mentor program for new folks, and I know that we could use help with that, if you're up for it!
Some of the lessons I learned along the way that I thought may be relevant, reading your other discussions:
- D&I is more than “at this conference we claim you won’t be harassed or assaulted, or we will take action if it happens”. For many marginalised groups, experiences in tech and tech communities are so poor, that it requires building a lot more trust in that a community is actually doing better in being a nice and safe place, and not just saying so. Personally, I think building this trust is the single hardest issue.
- Related to this, if people aren’t reporting incidents under your CoC, it doesn’t mean they didn’t happen. People (including me) can be very reluctant to report, and if they don’t trust the process enough might just end up leaving and telling their friends to stay away. In Django events, we’ve noticed a small increase in minor incident reports - not because more are happening, but because we’ve built enough trust that people report them.
- Statistics can be helpful, for example in tracking whether there is progress compared to before. They can also give an indication of whether things you’ve done seem effective. However, I’m skeptic of having direct numbers as single absolute goals. On the other hand, you can probably say that if 2% of speakers are women, something isn’t going right somewhere.
On intersectionality: any D&I initiative that wants to stay away from the complexity of intersectionality is dead in the water, as is an initiative that wants to treat everyone equal. My position, even being part of some marginalised groups, and my ability to participate in a community and attend events, is incomparably privileged compared to (for example, on average) a trans woman of colour or someone with housing or income insecurity. We can not treat everyone the same, because we are doing this in a society where marginalised groups and many others are already not treated equal or provided equal opportunities. And simplifying efforts to “sex discrimination” is simply way too narrow.
I hope that some of this was useful input. I also do a talk at a number of conferences on empathy in tech, which touches upon D&I and how experiences from marginalised people can be so different, and why this matters so much, among other things. A video should be out soon. In August I’ll be doing a talk at DjangoCon US about the Django CoC, the processes behind it and some of the myths, which might be interesting to this group too.
I would be interested! Is that a talk you might be interested in giving at RIPE, about your experience with Django and how it might apply to other communities? (Putting on my programme committee hat)
Leslie
Erik
PS: Could someone update the XX/XY labeling on the attendee gender graphs on RIPE labs[5]? Guessing gender from names is hard and inaccurate already, but sometimes all we have and I understand that. However, unless you have an algorithm that actually guesses their chromosomes, labeling the groups as XX and XY is wrong and completely erases transgender people.
[1] https://github.com/erikr/lessobviouschecklist [2] https://djangoproject.com/conduct/ [3] https://www.djangoproject.com/conduct/enforcement-manual/ [4] https://github.com/django/code-of-conduct [5] https://labs.ripe.net/Members/agowland/diversity-discussions-at-ripe-74 _______________________________________________ Diversity mailing list Diversity@ripe.net https://lists.ripe.net/mailman/listinfo/diversity
On 12/07/2017 13:24, Erik Romijn wrote:
On intersectionality: any D&I initiative that wants to stay away from the complexity of intersectionality is dead in the water, as is an initiative that wants to treat everyone equal. [snip] We can not treat everyone the same, because we are doing this in a society where marginalised groups and many others are already not treated equal or provided equal opportunities. And simplifying efforts to “sex discrimination” is simply way too narrow.
I wanted to address this point separately, because it cuts to the core of one of the discussions we are having, and because Erik is not the only participant to have spoken against the principle of equality. If we adopt the idea of non-discrimination, equal treatment and respect for the individual as a participant as our organising principle, this will indeed leave certain approaches to diversity based on bias and preference "dead in the water". I don't think we should be ashamed of that; we should embrace it. But that doesn't mean that there is no legitimate agenda for diversity and inclusion. So I'd like, in this e-mail, to set out a non-exhaustive list of activities I would like this taskforce to consider as part of an inclusion agenda that respects people as individuals. 1. Commitment to non-discrimination. We should draft and recommend for community consensus approval a commitment to avoid discrimination and bias. Nobody should be treated more or less favourably in their participation in the RIPE community on account of their sex, race, gender self-identification, adult age, sexual orientation, nationality within the RIPE NCC service region, and probably a number of other characteristics. Are there further characteristics that should normally be irrelevant, but might possibly be relevant in certain defined ways or in particular circumstances? We should work this through. 2. Survey of experiences and attitudes to existing behaviour We should consider a community survey to discover - have participants experienced abusively discriminatory treatment? (presumably some will have, but we need to ascertain prevalence) - how did this affect them? - in particular, would RIPE participants feel comfortable recommending participation to others, or would they feel the need to warn/caution about the existence of abusive behaviours - is there a community appetite for more formalised means of policing such behaviours? I think we should also consider trying to actively survey former community participants who no longer participate, to discover if non-participation was motivated by a previous negative experience (again, prevalence); and also, if not, to discover if there was another identifiable lack that might be remediable. 3. Regional inclusion: venue policy My own perception is that RIPE meetings are predominantly held in Northern, Western and Central Europe, with an under-representation for venues further east, in Central Asia and the Gulf region. We could start by looking at actual data on venues, and also ask the NCC how they currently go about choosing a venue, and what considerations (and constraints) apply. Then I think we need to have a discussion about what constitutes "fair circulation". Should we have a strict policy of circulating between subregions (e.g. Scandinavia, Balkans, Gulf, Southern EU, Caucusas etc)? Should we accept bias in favour of regions with more Internet users? With more network operators? With more existing RIPE participants? Permanently, or as a temporary concession to pragmatism, while aiming towards stricter circulation? 4. Regional inclusion: awareness raising The NCC is already conducting an awareness programme to seek to reduce non-participation by reason of lack of awareness in particular regions. What part could or should the RIPE community play in furthering that goal? Are there opportunities to encourage direct partnership between existing community participants (or their employers/affiliates) and the NCC, rather than expecting the NCC to carry this all on their own? Linked with this is the issue of relations between RIPE and local NOGs and related groups. Again, this is being developed by the NCC - and again, we should consider whether there are opportunities for the community, or participants within it, to work more actively with the NCC on this. 5. Practical barriers to accessibility Lack of certain facilities may discourage some people from participating. Childcare/creche facilities have already been mentioned as an example of a facility that might assist participation. Are there others we can think of? Perhaps we should ask the community for ideas. A few possibilities that spring to my mind (unfiltered for validity, viability or good sense): - any possible improvements to remote participation? - do we consider needs of wheelchair users/other disabilities? sufficiently consistently to be relied upon? - financial support? - consider whether Mon-Fri is always the best choice of days (are we doing Sun-Thurs in Dubai??) - while I think English is likely to need to remain the working language, is there more that can be done to assist those who don't speak it proficiently or who lack confidence? - would some potential participants benefit from more direct support in persuading their employers to authorise their attendance? (I know the ITU offers "letters of invitation"; is that a useful idea? How about "Dear boss, Your employee has asked to attend a RIPE meeting. But what do you get out of it?") That's all I've got for now, but I'm sure it's just a start on what we might look at to help make this community as welcoming as it can be. I hope this demonstrates that an agenda based on respect for participants as individuals rather than as demographic statistics is a positive and active agenda worth supporting. -- Malcolm Hutty | tel: +44 20 7645 3523 Head of Public Affairs | Read the LINX Public Affairs blog London Internet Exchange | http://publicaffairs.linx.net/ London Internet Exchange Ltd Monument Place, 24 Monument Street London EC3R 8AJ Company Registered in England No. 3137929 Trinity Court, Trinity Street, Peterborough PE1 1DA
Hi Malcom, I'd like to address your point that "Erik is not the only participant to have spoken against the principle of equality." Erik said that "We can not treat everyone the same". That doesn't mean that we won't treat everyone as equal. You seem to be confusing "same" and "equal". 2 + 2 is equal to 1 + 3, but it is not the same. When a conference organiser is giving a solution 2 + 2 (figuratively speaking) to the participants, it might only work for 70%. If then the organiser also offers solution 1 + 3, this is NOT discriminating against the 70%, but only treating the remaining 30% equally. This is why there are special lines for disabled people at airports. It is not the same treatment as the rest, but it tries to put them at equal footing. Even though this is different treatment, this is not discrimination against other people. My 2 cents. Gergana On 14/07/17 05:11, Malcolm Hutty wrote:
On 12/07/2017 13:24, Erik Romijn wrote:
On intersectionality: any D&I initiative that wants to stay away from the complexity of intersectionality is dead in the water, as is an initiative that wants to treat everyone equal. [snip] We can not treat everyone the same, because we are doing this in a society where marginalised groups and many others are already not treated equal or provided equal opportunities. And simplifying efforts to “sex discrimination” is simply way too narrow.
I wanted to address this point separately, because it cuts to the core of one of the discussions we are having, and because Erik is not the only participant to have spoken against the principle of equality.
If we adopt the idea of non-discrimination, equal treatment and respect for the individual as a participant as our organising principle, this will indeed leave certain approaches to diversity based on bias and preference "dead in the water". I don't think we should be ashamed of that; we should embrace it.
But that doesn't mean that there is no legitimate agenda for diversity and inclusion. So I'd like, in this e-mail, to set out a non-exhaustive list of activities I would like this taskforce to consider as part of an inclusion agenda that respects people as individuals.
1. Commitment to non-discrimination.
We should draft and recommend for community consensus approval a commitment to avoid discrimination and bias. Nobody should be treated more or less favourably in their participation in the RIPE community on account of their sex, race, gender self-identification, adult age, sexual orientation, nationality within the RIPE NCC service region, and probably a number of other characteristics. Are there further characteristics that should normally be irrelevant, but might possibly be relevant in certain defined ways or in particular circumstances? We should work this through.
2. Survey of experiences and attitudes to existing behaviour
We should consider a community survey to discover - have participants experienced abusively discriminatory treatment? (presumably some will have, but we need to ascertain prevalence) - how did this affect them? - in particular, would RIPE participants feel comfortable recommending participation to others, or would they feel the need to warn/caution about the existence of abusive behaviours - is there a community appetite for more formalised means of policing such behaviours?
I think we should also consider trying to actively survey former community participants who no longer participate, to discover if non-participation was motivated by a previous negative experience (again, prevalence); and also, if not, to discover if there was another identifiable lack that might be remediable.
3. Regional inclusion: venue policy
My own perception is that RIPE meetings are predominantly held in Northern, Western and Central Europe, with an under-representation for venues further east, in Central Asia and the Gulf region. We could start by looking at actual data on venues, and also ask the NCC how they currently go about choosing a venue, and what considerations (and constraints) apply. Then I think we need to have a discussion about what constitutes "fair circulation". Should we have a strict policy of circulating between subregions (e.g. Scandinavia, Balkans, Gulf, Southern EU, Caucusas etc)? Should we accept bias in favour of regions with more Internet users? With more network operators? With more existing RIPE participants? Permanently, or as a temporary concession to pragmatism, while aiming towards stricter circulation?
4. Regional inclusion: awareness raising
The NCC is already conducting an awareness programme to seek to reduce non-participation by reason of lack of awareness in particular regions. What part could or should the RIPE community play in furthering that goal? Are there opportunities to encourage direct partnership between existing community participants (or their employers/affiliates) and the NCC, rather than expecting the NCC to carry this all on their own?
Linked with this is the issue of relations between RIPE and local NOGs and related groups. Again, this is being developed by the NCC - and again, we should consider whether there are opportunities for the community, or participants within it, to work more actively with the NCC on this.
5. Practical barriers to accessibility
Lack of certain facilities may discourage some people from participating. Childcare/creche facilities have already been mentioned as an example of a facility that might assist participation. Are there others we can think of? Perhaps we should ask the community for ideas.
A few possibilities that spring to my mind (unfiltered for validity, viability or good sense): - any possible improvements to remote participation? - do we consider needs of wheelchair users/other disabilities? sufficiently consistently to be relied upon? - financial support? - consider whether Mon-Fri is always the best choice of days (are we doing Sun-Thurs in Dubai??) - while I think English is likely to need to remain the working language, is there more that can be done to assist those who don't speak it proficiently or who lack confidence? - would some potential participants benefit from more direct support in persuading their employers to authorise their attendance? (I know the ITU offers "letters of invitation"; is that a useful idea? How about "Dear boss, Your employee has asked to attend a RIPE meeting. But what do you get out of it?")
That's all I've got for now, but I'm sure it's just a start on what we might look at to help make this community as welcoming as it can be.
I hope this demonstrates that an agenda based on respect for participants as individuals rather than as demographic statistics is a positive and active agenda worth supporting.
On 14/07/2017 10:26, Gergana Petrova wrote:
When a conference organiser is giving a solution 2 + 2 (figuratively speaking) to the participants, it might only work for 70%. If then the organiser also offers solution 1 + 3, this is NOT discriminating against the 70%, but only treating the remaining 30% equally.
I've always been sceptical about "separate but equal", but YMMV. Did you have any thoughts on my proposal? -- Malcolm Hutty | tel: +44 20 7645 3523 Head of Public Affairs | Read the LINX Public Affairs blog London Internet Exchange | http://publicaffairs.linx.net/ London Internet Exchange Ltd Monument Place, 24 Monument Street London EC3R 8AJ Company Registered in England No. 3137929 Trinity Court, Trinity Street, Peterborough PE1 1DA
On Thu, Jul 13, 2017 at 8:11 PM, Malcolm Hutty <malcolm@linx.net> wrote:
On 12/07/2017 13:24, Erik Romijn wrote:
On intersectionality: any D&I initiative that wants to stay away from the complexity of intersectionality is dead in the water, as is an initiative that wants to treat everyone equal. [snip] We can not treat everyone the same, because we are doing this in a society where marginalised groups and many others are already not treated equal or provided equal opportunities. And simplifying efforts to “sex discrimination” is simply way too narrow.
I wanted to address this point separately, because it cuts to the core of one of the discussions we are having, and because Erik is not the only participant to have spoken against the principle of equality.
If we adopt the idea of non-discrimination, equal treatment and respect for the individual as a participant as our organising principle, this will indeed leave certain approaches to diversity based on bias and preference "dead in the water". I don't think we should be ashamed of that; we should embrace it.
But that doesn't mean that there is no legitimate agenda for diversity and inclusion. So I'd like, in this e-mail, to set out a non-exhaustive list of activities I would like this taskforce to consider as part of an inclusion agenda that respects people as individuals.
1. Commitment to non-discrimination.
We should draft and recommend for community consensus approval a commitment to avoid discrimination and bias. Nobody should be treated more or less favourably in their participation in the RIPE community on account of their sex, race, gender self-identification, adult age, sexual orientation, nationality within the RIPE NCC service region, and probably a number of other characteristics. Are there further characteristics that should normally be irrelevant, but might possibly be relevant in certain defined ways or in particular circumstances? We should work this through.
Do you feel like the Code of Conduct https://ripe74.ripe.net/on-site/code-of-conduct/ and https://www.ripe.net/participate/mail/ripe-mailing-list-ripe-forum-code-of-c... is not sufficient? What's it lacking?
2. Survey of experiences and attitudes to existing behaviour
We should consider a community survey to discover - have participants experienced abusively discriminatory treatment? (presumably some will have, but we need to ascertain prevalence) - how did this affect them? - in particular, would RIPE participants feel comfortable recommending participation to others, or would they feel the need to warn/caution about the existence of abusive behaviours - is there a community appetite for more formalised means of policing such behaviours?
I think we should also consider trying to actively survey former community participants who no longer participate, to discover if non-participation was motivated by a previous negative experience (again, prevalence); and also, if not, to discover if there was another identifiable lack that might be remediable.
Giving a survey of people's experiences is a good idea, but not if it the purpose is only to say "there's not a problem" as it is very difficult (close to impossible) to survey people who have left the community and people who don't feel comfortable joining in the first place. There's survivorship bias.
3. Regional inclusion: venue policy
My own perception is that RIPE meetings are predominantly held in Northern, Western and Central Europe, with an under-representation for venues further east, in Central Asia and the Gulf region. We could start by looking at actual data on venues, and also ask the NCC how they currently go about choosing a venue, and what considerations (and constraints) apply. Then I think we need to have a discussion about what constitutes "fair circulation". Should we have a strict policy of circulating between subregions (e.g. Scandinavia, Balkans, Gulf, Southern EU, Caucusas etc)? Should we accept bias in favour of regions with more Internet users? With more network operators? With more existing RIPE participants? Permanently, or as a temporary concession to pragmatism, while aiming towards stricter circulation?
Were you at RIPE73? Hans Petter did a lot of talking about this when Dubai was announced. The RIPE NCC does a lot of work on venue selection, but is limited to where groups step up for sponsorship.
4. Regional inclusion: awareness raising
The NCC is already conducting an awareness programme to seek to reduce non-participation by reason of lack of awareness in particular regions. What part could or should the RIPE community play in furthering that goal? Are there opportunities to encourage direct partnership between existing community participants (or their employers/affiliates) and the NCC, rather than expecting the NCC to carry this all on their own?
Linked with this is the issue of relations between RIPE and local NOGs and related groups. Again, this is being developed by the NCC - and again, we should consider whether there are opportunities for the community, or participants within it, to work more actively with the NCC on this.
5. Practical barriers to accessibility
Lack of certain facilities may discourage some people from participating. Childcare/creche facilities have already been mentioned as an example of a facility that might assist participation. Are there others we can think of? Perhaps we should ask the community for ideas.
A few possibilities that spring to my mind (unfiltered for validity, viability or good sense): - any possible improvements to remote participation? - do we consider needs of wheelchair users/other disabilities? sufficiently consistently to be relied upon? - financial support? - consider whether Mon-Fri is always the best choice of days (are we doing Sun-Thurs in Dubai??)
Yes, Sunday through Thursday is going to be the norm in Dubai (that information is highlighted on the meeting page https://ripe75.ripe.net/ )
- while I think English is likely to need to remain the working language, is there more that can be done to assist those who don't speak it proficiently or who lack confidence?
After talking with Osama from MENOG, this is not an issue in Dubai. In France for RIPE76, the PC is considering local language meetups or talks as an option.
- would some potential participants benefit from more direct support in persuading their employers to authorise their attendance? (I know the ITU offers "letters of invitation"; is that a useful idea? How about "Dear boss, Your employee has asked to attend a RIPE meeting. But what do you get out of it?")
That's all I've got for now, but I'm sure it's just a start on what we might look at to help make this community as welcoming as it can be.
I hope this demonstrates that an agenda based on respect for participants as individuals rather than as demographic statistics is a positive and active agenda worth supporting.
Trying to be more inclusive is not disrespecting individuals or pandering to demographic statistics. In fact it's respecting and celebrating that some individuals may have different needs and not trying to pretend we are all identical. Leslie
-- Malcolm Hutty | tel: +44 20 7645 3523 Head of Public Affairs | Read the LINX Public Affairs blog London Internet Exchange | http://publicaffairs.linx.net/
London Internet Exchange Ltd Monument Place, 24 Monument Street London EC3R 8AJ
Company Registered in England No. 3137929 Trinity Court, Trinity Street, Peterborough PE1 1DA
_______________________________________________ Diversity mailing list Diversity@ripe.net https://lists.ripe.net/mailman/listinfo/diversity
On 14/07/2017 15:03, Leslie wrote:
Do you feel like the Code of Conduct https://ripe74.ripe.net/on-site/code-of-conduct/ and https://www.ripe.net/participate/mail/ripe-mailing-list-ripe-forum-code-of-c... is not sufficient? What's it lacking?
Well it certainly worth a review to see if it's fit for purpose, especially since it was simply announced without community review.
I think we should also consider trying to actively survey former community participants who no longer participate, to discover if non-participation was motivated by a previous negative experience (again, prevalence); and also, if not, to discover if there was another identifiable lack that might be remediable.
Giving a survey of people's experiences is a good idea, but not if it the purpose is only to say "there's not a problem" as it is very difficult (close to impossible) to survey people who have left the community and people who don't feel comfortable joining in the first place. There's survivorship bias.
Thank you for your support for the idea. As I said, the purpose would be to discover the prevalence of abusive behaviour. You will also note that I proposed actively surveying former participants specifically to counter the risk of survivorship bias.
Trying to be more inclusive is not disrespecting individuals or pandering to demographic statistics.
No, but setting targets for demographic statistics for our community does constitute such pandering, will inevitably lead to actions that disrespect individuals (as it prioritises their membership of an identified group over what they have to contribute) and is, in my opinion, the opposite of inclusive. -- Malcolm Hutty | tel: +44 20 7645 3523 Head of Public Affairs | Read the LINX Public Affairs blog London Internet Exchange | http://publicaffairs.linx.net/ London Internet Exchange Ltd Monument Place, 24 Monument Street London EC3R 8AJ Company Registered in England No. 3137929 Trinity Court, Trinity Street, Peterborough PE1 1DA
Sent from the road while on tour On Jul 15, 2017 05:00, "Malcolm Hutty" <malcolm@linx.net> wrote: On 14/07/2017 15:03, Leslie wrote:
Do you feel like the Code of Conduct https://ripe74.ripe.net/on-site/code-of-conduct/ and https://www.ripe.net/participate/mail/ripe-mailing-
list-ripe-forum-code-of-conduct
is not sufficient? What's it lacking?
Well it certainly worth a review to see if it's fit for purpose, especially since it was simply announced without community review. It has been around for several meetings and printed on the badges for at least the last two meetings, if not more. It's not a secret by any means.
I think we should also consider trying to actively survey former community participants who no longer participate, to discover if non-participation was motivated by a previous negative experience (again, prevalence); and also, if not, to discover if there was another identifiable lack that might be remediable.
Giving a survey of people's experiences is a good idea, but not if it the purpose is only to say "there's not a problem" as it is very difficult (close to impossible) to survey people who have left the community and people who don't feel comfortable joining in the first place. There's survivorship bias.
Thank you for your support for the idea. As I said, the purpose would be to discover the prevalence of abusive behaviour. You will also note that I proposed actively surveying former participants specifically to counter the risk of survivorship bias. As I mentioned above, that is very difficult. How would you identify and reach out to the people who have left and don't feel comfortable joining?
Trying to be more inclusive is not disrespecting individuals or pandering to demographic statistics.
No, but setting targets for demographic statistics for our community does constitute such pandering, will inevitably lead to actions that disrespect individuals (as it prioritises their membership of an identified group over what they have to contribute) and is, in my opinion, the opposite of inclusive. -- Malcolm Hutty | tel: +44 20 7645 3523 Head of Public Affairs | Read the LINX Public Affairs blog London Internet Exchange | http://publicaffairs.linx.net/ London Internet Exchange Ltd Monument Place, 24 Monument Street London EC3R 8AJ Company Registered in England No. 3137929 Trinity Court, Trinity Street, Peterborough PE1 1DA
Sent from the road while on tour On Jul 15, 2017 08:25, "Leslie" <geekgirl@gmail.com> wrote: Sent from the road while on tour On Jul 15, 2017 05:00, "Malcolm Hutty" <malcolm@linx.net> wrote: On 14/07/2017 15:03, Leslie wrote:
Do you feel like the Code of Conduct https://ripe74.ripe.net/on-site/code-of-conduct/ and https://www.ripe.net/participate/mail/ripe-mailing-list-
ripe-forum-code-of-conduct
is not sufficient? What's it lacking?
Well it certainly worth a review to see if it's fit for purpose, especially since it was simply announced without community review. It has been around for several meetings and printed on the badges for at least the last two meetings, if not more. It's not a secret by any means. HPH has also displayed and talked about the code of conduct in his opening remarks at the last several meetings.
I think we should also consider trying to actively survey former community participants who no longer participate, to discover if non-participation was motivated by a previous negative experience (again, prevalence); and also, if not, to discover if there was another identifiable lack that might be remediable.
Giving a survey of people's experiences is a good idea, but not if it the purpose is only to say "there's not a problem" as it is very difficult (close to impossible) to survey people who have left the community and people who don't feel comfortable joining in the first place. There's survivorship bias.
Thank you for your support for the idea. As I said, the purpose would be to discover the prevalence of abusive behaviour. You will also note that I proposed actively surveying former participants specifically to counter the risk of survivorship bias. As I mentioned above, that is very difficult. How would you identify and reach out to the people who have left and don't feel comfortable joining?
Trying to be more inclusive is not disrespecting individuals or pandering to demographic statistics.
No, but setting targets for demographic statistics for our community does constitute such pandering, will inevitably lead to actions that disrespect individuals (as it prioritises their membership of an identified group over what they have to contribute) and is, in my opinion, the opposite of inclusive. -- Malcolm Hutty | tel: +44 20 7645 3523 Head of Public Affairs | Read the LINX Public Affairs blog London Internet Exchange | http://publicaffairs.linx.net/ London Internet Exchange Ltd Monument Place, 24 Monument Street London EC3R 8AJ Company Registered in England No. 3137929 Trinity Court, Trinity Street, Peterborough PE1 1DA
Yes, it's not a secret. But it was announced rather than suggested, and there has been no community review yet. Sent from my iPhone
On 15 Jul 2017, at 16:28, Leslie <geekgirl@gmail.com> wrote:
It has been around for several meetings and printed on the badges for at least the last two meetings, if not more. It's not a secret by any means.
HPH has also displayed and talked about the code of conduct in his opening remarks at the last several meetings.
Malcolm, The CoC was suggested, then formally proposed, discussed by a small group within the community, watered down, agreed to by the WG Chairs and then announced. It was the product of much community conversation. It has been improved since its first versions and is heading in the right direction, but there's more work to do there. I think it's mostly suitable for our community, all all such things must be constantly reviewed to make sure they're still relevant. However I feel that isn't what you mean. What kind of review are you talking about here and what would you see as possible outcomes? This TF hasn't been tasked with looking at the CoC but it is core to what we're doing. Brian Brian Nisbet Network Operations Manager HEAnet CLG, Ireland's National Education and Research Network 1st Floor, 5 George's Dock, IFSC, Dublin D01 X8N7, Ireland +35316609040 brian.nisbet@heanet.ie www.heanet.ie Registered in Ireland, No. 275301. CRA No. 20036270 On 15/07/2017 18:28, Malcolm Hutty wrote:
Yes, it's not a secret. But it was announced rather than suggested, and there has been no community review yet.
Sent from my iPhone
On 15 Jul 2017, at 16:28, Leslie <geekgirl@gmail.com <mailto:geekgirl@gmail.com>> wrote:
It has been around for several meetings and printed on the badges for at least the last two meetings, if not more. It's not a secret by any means.
HPH has also displayed and talked about the code of conduct in his opening remarks at the last several meetings.
_______________________________________________ Diversity mailing list Diversity@ripe.net https://lists.ripe.net/mailman/listinfo/diversity
On 17/07/2017 09:19, Brian Nisbet wrote:
Malcolm,
The CoC was suggested, then formally proposed, discussed by a small group within the community, watered down, agreed to by the WG Chairs and then announced.
What you appear to be describing is a process in which some people came up with it (you?), and WG chairs had input into the drafting but nobody else. That's not a community process. Or was the wording proposed on ripe-list or in plenary for discussion before it went to the WG Chairs? If so, I missed it - which is quite possible, I must admit.
This TF hasn't been tasked with looking at the CoC but it is core to what we're doing.
OK then. -- Malcolm Hutty | tel: +44 20 7645 3523 Head of Public Affairs | Read the LINX Public Affairs blog London Internet Exchange | http://publicaffairs.linx.net/ London Internet Exchange Ltd Monument Place, 24 Monument Street London EC3R 8AJ Company Registered in England No. 3137929 Trinity Court, Trinity Street, Peterborough PE1 1DA
On 17/07/2017 10:28, Malcolm Hutty wrote:
On 17/07/2017 09:19, Brian Nisbet wrote:
Malcolm,
The CoC was suggested, then formally proposed, discussed by a small group within the community, watered down, agreed to by the WG Chairs and then announced.
What you appear to be describing is a process in which some people came up with it (you?), and WG chairs had input into the drafting but nobody else. That's not a community process.
You know, I'd started to write a mail to document the history of the Code of Conduct, then I stopped. For a start I'm not sure what kind of community process would satisfy you, but more to the point I don't understand your objection. We had (have?) a problem, some wording and light process was brought in to address that. It was necessary. The community, by virtue of accepting this, agreed with it. And I think over time that agreement and acceptance has grown.
Or was the wording proposed on ripe-list or in plenary for discussion before it went to the WG Chairs? If so, I missed it - which is quite possible, I must admit.
This TF hasn't been tasked with looking at the CoC but it is core to what we're doing.
OK then.
And I'm glad we're agreed on this. Obviously you can, as a member of the community, take up these issues with the RIPE Chair etc, but I will admit I'm having a hard time understanding your issue here. But I'm happy to take it to private email. Brian
Sent from my iPhone
On 15 Jul 2017, at 16:25, Leslie <geekgirl@gmail.com> wrote:
You will also note that I proposed actively surveying former participants specifically to counter the risk of survivorship bias.
As I mentioned above, that is very difficult. How would you identify and reach out to the people who have left and don't feel comfortable joining?
I don't see any particular additional difficulty in contacting those that recently participated but no longer do so, using the contact details they provided at registration, and ask them why (and whether cessation was due to a negative experience). I'm not talking about reaching back 20 years.
On 14 Jul 2017, at 05:11, Malcolm Hutty <malcolm@linx.net> wrote:
I wanted to address this point separately, because it cuts to the core of one of the discussions we are having, and because Erik is not the only participant to have spoken against the principle of equality.
If we adopt the idea of non-discrimination, equal treatment and respect for the individual as a participant as our organising principle, this will indeed leave certain approaches to diversity based on bias and preference "dead in the water". I don't think we should be ashamed of that; we should embrace it. [snip]
I strongly disagree with this part. I feel this graphic explains my position well: https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CiUx_GlXEAQYIFg.jpg Not everyone is equal when they come into the community. Not everyone has had the same opportunities, has the same costs, the same health, the same freedoms. These issues are institutional and endemic in our wider society. And if inside the community we insist on treat everyone the same, it means that the outcome is still drastically unfair, and we reinforce bias, rather than countering it. Mind you, I am not in favour of e.g. a hard quota in speaker selection. However, as an example, I have often seen financial aid programs where priority is given to people from underrepresented and/or marginalised groups, which makes sense to me, as there are (on average) financial consequences of being part of such a group, limiting the ability to participate. Especially in RIPE meetings, as even speakers have to pay for a full ticket and their own travel. This biases speaker selection to people who are better off financially and who have an easier time finding work, or putting some pressure on their employer, amongst other things.
2. Survey of experiences and attitudes to existing behaviour [..]
I am not opposed to such a survey, but I would expect it to be heavily biased towards a more positive image. I’m skeptic on how many people who no longer participate would enter, especially those that left due to bad experiences. Personally in those cases, I’d rather just leave it behind and forget. In particular, I would be very reluctant to share those experiences with that same community - and I see this with friends too. As another example, I recently encountered sexist and queerphobic remarks at a conference which had a CoC, but this involved a conference organiser, so I did not report. If there were this kind of survey, I would similarly not have reported it. I warned my friends though. In general, any kind of talking about any kind of negative experience comes with risk. So the question is always: how much will I improve things by talking about this, how much do I care, and is that worth the risk?
3. Regional inclusion: venue policy [..]
This is a particularly difficult issue, as different locations come with different benefits and issues for different people. For some people Schengen visa are hard to obtain. For me, any travel to the Middle East or Russia would be most unwise. This is the same in the Django/Python community, which is a reason for having conferences in almost every region. There is no single location that works great for everyone.
- do we consider needs of wheelchair users/other disabilities? sufficiently consistently to be relied upon?
A good start may be an accessibility policy, with some suggestions here: https://twitter.com/ellenfromnowon/status/846010218404306946
- financial support?
Yes. Even a small program can help, especially for an event that requires even speakers to even pay for tickets.
- while I think English is likely to need to remain the working language, is there more that can be done to assist those who don't speak it proficiently or who lack confidence?
Live transcription is a huge benefit already. Beyond that, I have no immediate ideas.
- would some potential participants benefit from more direct support in persuading their employers to authorise their attendance? (I know the ITU offers "letters of invitation"; is that a useful idea? How about "Dear boss, Your employee has asked to attend a RIPE meeting. But what do you get out of it?”)
This doesn’t apply to me personally, but I know a lot more conferences do this, for example: https://2017.djangocon.us/why-djangocon-us/ I imagine the effort is small, and mostly one time, so this feels like it’s worth it. Erik
Hi all, with my RIPE NCC hat off - and with my "participant in the RIPE Community" hat on: On 14/07/17 05:11, Malcolm Hutty wrote:
But that doesn't mean that there is no legitimate agenda for diversity and inclusion. So I'd like, in this e-mail, to set out a non-exhaustive list of activities I would like this taskforce to consider as part of an inclusion agenda that respects people as individuals.
1. Commitment to non-discrimination. done
2. Survey of experiences and attitudes to existing behaviour done
3. Regional inclusion: venue policy done
4. Regional inclusion: awareness raising ongoing
5. Practical barriers to accessibility
dealing with it - part of the efforts are "tasked" to this group; other efforts are RACI, fellowship... and many other, described here: https://labs.ripe.net/Members/agowland/diversity-discussions-at-ripe-74
A few possibilities that spring to my mind (unfiltered for validity, viability or good sense):
thanks for this brainstorm, we will add it to the other non-exhaustive lists of practical actionable points we came up with, both in the workshop and later on, in the Friday-morning session. For everyone who joined the task force since we posted this link, here is the reminder: we have an Etherpad, which might be a good tool for keeping track of such to-do lists: http://etherpad.tools.ietf.org:9000/p/ripe-diversity-tf-2017 Vesna
participants (7)
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Brian Nisbet -
Erik Romijn -
Gergana Petrova -
Leslie -
Malcolm Hutty -
Sasha Romijn -
Vesna Manojlovic