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Comment by jawns | Hacker News Reader

Do you know who's going to gravitate toward projects with a Code of Merit instead of a Code of Conduct?

People who are ostracized by projects with a Code of Conduct.

Or, to put it another way, if you're a jerk and you argue with other contributors about an on-topic issue in a jerky way, then under a Code of Merit, you still come out on top as long as you're technically correct (the best kind of correct!), even if it leaves other contributors feeling put down.

Granted, there is some overlap. For example, both the Code of Merit and most codes of conduct disallow disparaging remarks based on protected characteristics. But the Code of Merit disallows them because they're considered irrelevant to the project, whereas codes of conduct disallow them because they're affronts to dignity.

I do take issue with many codes of conduct in the tech space, because I think they tend to be written in a bubble world where everyone assumes that everyone else thinks just like them, but a Code of Merit sounds like it's even more problematic.

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> I do take issue with many codes of conduct in the tech space, because I think they tend to be written in a bubble world where everyone assumes that everyone else thinks just like them, but a Code of Merit sounds like it's even more problematic.

I take issue with them because a Codes of Conduct doesn't make a space safe. And also because if we need a written list of what behaviour is tolerated, we have a much greater problem than a code of conduct will solve.

I've seen people write about the former; I haven't about the latter. I find a CoC offputting because it equates me with the lowest of the low. It says I can't be trusted to behave like a decent human being and need to be told what's right and what's wrong, like being back at school.

I also see it as darker than "assumes that everyone else thinks just like them". Some - not all - are about controlling the world into the form the CoC proponent(s) want it to be. The CoC goes beyond its words and into society.

Neither do I support the Meritocracy thing, as I've had it used on me too many times by people who are super-smart and see that as a reason to be jerks.

> It says I can't be trusted to behave like a decent human being and need to be told what's right and what's wrong.

Do you leave your door unlocked and your keys in your car? If not, aren't you assuming that there are some people out there who can't be trusted? If I come to your house and find it locked, should I be insulted that you've not "trusted me to behave like a decent human being"?

> Do you leave your door unlocked and your keys in your car? If not, aren't you assuming that there are some people out there who can't be trusted? If I come to your house and find it locked, should I be insulted that you've not "trusted me to behave like a decent human being"?

Are you meaning to equate those who don't follow CoC's to criminals?

My response would be that those are societal norms, we define the transgressors as law breakers, and have a criminal system to deal with them. People take precautions against them.

In the same way I expect to walk into a pub and not get punched in the face, I expect to take part in an open source project and not shit all over someone / be shat on.

> I find a CoC offputting because it equates me with the lowest of the low. It says I can't be trusted to behave like a decent human being and need to be told what's right and what's wrong, like being back at school.

Do you have the same reaction to automated linters or being told to write unit tests? What about the enforcement sections of the GPL? I mean, you, not being the lowest of the low, aren't going to write buggy code or reuse software unfairly, right? Isn't it an insult for people to imply that you might?

> Do you have the same reaction to automated linters or being told to write unit tests?

There's a huge difference between technical processes that have gone through extensive peer-review processes and survived decades-long debates until a technical community reached the consensus that the practices indeed produce better software and brand-new social practices that are difficult to universally enforce. Making the statement "I don't need a list of unprofessional conduct to maintain a professional community" must be true, since you could never enumerate all unprofessional conduct anyway. You'll either leave something out (so the trolls can say "na na na, you can't get me!", in which case the method didn't work) or you'll encompass too many behaviors, which means different trolls can selectively enforce the terms of the CoC. Either way, it seems like a losing scenario.

>What about the enforcement sections of the GPL?

The terms of the GPL are criticized by many; that's why some projects choose different licenses.

> There's a huge difference between technical processes that have gone through extensive peer-review processes and survived decades-long debates until a technical community reached the consensus that the practices indeed produce better software

I'm curious - I've seen debates about test-driven development, or how to appropriately test things, but never debates about whether testing or automated linting itself produced better software.

> The terms of the GPL are criticized by many; that's why some projects choose different licenses.

Sure, but I've never heard anyone criticize it on the grounds that it insulted them or called them untrustworthy, and be taken seriously. Same with testing, come to think of it. There are lots of serious debates; "Are you calling me a bad coder" is not one of them. I'm happy to see debate about different forms of codes of conduct, but why are we taking "I am insulted by this" as a legitimate argument?

Fair point. So the response "it's insulting because it implies I'm a bad person" to a CoC discussion is shaky because the presence of a formal process designed to achieve some objective (e.g. better software, or (in the case of a CoC) a better community) does not imply any particular participant is at-fault, but rather is an evidence-based assessment that without the process the measure of some specific quality degrades. Thanks for the clarification here :)

This is totally outside the scope of your specific point, but I think it is important to note that the objective "a better community" is difficult to measure. My question: is a CoC an evidence-based response? Many software communities have moved to adopt CoCs, but what are the effects? Is there selection bias in studying a community with a CoC because (by virtue of accepting the CoC) the community is more likely to reject unprofessional behavior? How do CoCs function in a global society where actions that are appropriate in one culture might be taboo in another? Who/What is the arbiter of cultural disagreements - NAP? But the understanding of violence/aggression once again falls apart in the wake of cultural differences.

Ultimately, the answers to these questions are decided by the CoC, but who are the authors and evangelizers? The contributor covenant first appeared in 2014, and rapidly (e.g. within 1 year) saw Google (for example, there were many other large tech companies) adopt it for public projects. I believe that we should consider what the motivations are for these multi-national companies to so quickly adopt these rules.

I am not aware of non-anecdotal results here and I would be interested in seeing them - of course many CoC proponents will say that it's the right thing to do whether or not it produces a more technically meritorious project and this is legitimizing the view of a meritocracy, but I am personally expecting the answer to be that the project will in fact be more meritorious, and I think data would go a long way to arguing against (what I perceive as) biases and gut feelings against Contributor Covenant-like CoCs masquerading as data-driven concerns.

Based on what _you_ define as affronts to dignity.

There are a lot of very intelligent people who see problems with society and critique society, but society doesn't like that much. Intelligent people do very good work and tend to get along with other people who think deeply.

If an affront to dignity is simply a well thought out critique or parody of society, I can see Code of Merit projects doing very well indeed...

> who's going to gravitate toward projects with a Code of Merit

Nobody. That doesn't even seem to be the intent; it's not so much something to be adopted on its own merit as it is a passive-aggressive critique of real codes of conduct. Note how it repeatedly addresses what one may not do to address any kind of conflict or bad behavior, but it doesn't spell out any mechanisms to enforce even its own rules. Contrary to another commenter who says this can and should exist alongside a code of conduct, I interpret this as (intentionally) undermining any such companion.

It's just a not-so-clever way to imply that people who believe in codes of conduct don't believe in meritocracy (paragraph 4), lack technical prowess (para 6), seek disruption and deviation (paras 7 and 14) - all without actually having the guts to come out and say so. Thus it falls afoul of its own injunction to "discuss or debate the idea" (paragraph 9) because it doesn't even mention - let alone address - the arguments in favor of what it seeks to destroy.

I have never understood why people feel strongly about "Code of Conduct" statements. It seems insane to me that someone would profoundly object to guidelines that effectively say "don't be an asshole".

But it happens!

There are people rage-quitting stackoverflow/stackexchange communities expressly because of they can't abide with the new initiatives/CoC that say one has to be nice and get along with others.

I guess this is yet another manifestation of that impulse. Maybe someday someone will write up a psychological analysis of this kind of behavior. I sure don't understand it.

> Maybe someday someone will write up a psychological analysis of this kind of behavior.

I would like to read that; both what's driving the thinking behind adoption, and the responses.

You could apply it to any organisation that requires you to sign up to its rules before joining.

> It seems insane to me that someone would profoundly object to guidelines that effectively say "don't be an asshole".

Does this help? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18075200

    > Does this help? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18075200

Very well put.

But I still can't fathom a _real_ situation where CoC would cause me to reconsider participation, let-alone quit and look for alternatives which serve up something like that "Code of Merit".

In the high-profile spaces which have implemented CoC's, they've been a reaction to long-established patterns of bad behavior (I am thinking specifically about stackoverflow). It remains to be seen whether the CoC in stackoverflow helps, but I don't think it hurts.

In general, I think online communities are much more prone by being overrun with assholes than face-to-face communities. In the case of stackoverflow, they've game-ified the interactions to such an extent that it has become a very weird place to ask a question. In their quest for quantifiable objectivity, they've attracted personality types that think it's OK to be hostile in order to satisfy what they think "the mission" of stackoverflow is. It has gotten bad enough that people are reacting and their new CoC is their attempt at making amends.

understood why people feel strongly about "Code of Conduct" statements

Offered as a possible explanation without taking a side: it is because the author of the CoC is perceived as asserting their moral superiority over the others, and the others don’t recognise that person as having earned the right to do so, such as by being a long-standing member of the community with an exemplary track record themselves. The actual content of the CoC isn’t the issue.

In the specific case of SO, it’s probably that certain behaviours were actively encouraged by the owners of the site via points and badges, then suddenly they changed their minds. People feel stabbed in the back.

I haven’t ragequit anything, this is all just a theory, not direct experience

I think it's mostly an objection to authoritarianism, to intolerance under the guise of tolerance, and specifically to the idea that there is a right to not be offended, which implies the right of anyone to prevent speech simply by declaring that they are offended by it, which is seen as a major danger to society and in particular to minorities who don't have the luck of being recognized as a protected class by those who push for these CoCs.

Or to put it more succinctly: People see a bait and switch. The superficial language doesn't really seem all that objectionable, but if you look into the ideology behind it, you might find they have a very specific idea of what "don't be an asshole" means that maybe doesn't quite match what you'd expect.

    > you might find they have a very specific idea of what "don't be an asshole" means that maybe doesn't quite match what you'd expect.

I think that's a compelling reason to be skeptical of CoC's but I can't come up with an example where I would be surprised at what "don't be an asshole" actually means to the anyone that wrote the CoC's that seem rather common.

Being more than superficially religious would qualify. For example, the statement "I support traditional marriage and think it makes for a stronger society". There are lots of people who would scream their heads off in public at someone for simply saying that. There's quite a few examples I can think of...

Many of the CoC's I have read specifically allow Racism against specific targets and allow sexism against specific targets. In veiled language off course, but it is still there. Even when that stuff isn't there it will be misused to target political "opponents" as we have already seen starting with the Linux CoC.

There will always be some people looking to take advantage of "the rules".

For some, that means finding bizarre loopholes far outside any reasonable intention of the rules. For others, it means attempting to enforce the rules with such rigidity that almost anything can be seen as a violation.

I think a healthy community will realize that it is not their rules that makes them resilient, but rather their ability to use sound judgement and be flexible about problems and solutions. Linux will not be destroyed by a CoC that tries to be more inclusive even if there are attempts at abusing that CoC.

Why have a CoC then at all? If you know that it is not the rules that make them resilient then why make them at all. All they serve to do is giving ways to exclude people based on Loopholes and overly strict interpretation of said rules.

If the leadership interpreting those rules are reasonable then they wouldn't need these rules in the first place, if they are not reasonable then the rules are useless.

Especially since CoC are most often applied in a very Hypocritical way. The CoC states "Being respectful of differing viewpoints and experiences" which is however only true if you have one of the approved viewpoints. Which we are seeing right now with the Linux CoC. Of course no one does anything about all the slanderous accusations that get made to oust someone with the CoC even though those accusations themselves are violating the CoC.

It is also especially worrisome that these pushes for CoC or language policing come mostly from the outside and try to dictate the rules you need to follow and the rules that you need to make people in your project follow.

The thing is Linus HIMSELF has admitted that there is a problem and that he was a part of the problem. He has not only signed off on the CoC, but has also stepped down for a while. Like I said, the CoC is an effort to address things that have been going wrong in certain communities-- like Linux, Stackoverflow, and some conferences. If everything were A-OK, there would be no need for them.

With the risk of sounding like a tinfoil conspiracy theorist here: I don't believe that this came from him. This came from outside pressure. Not just the fact that parts of his statements where clearly written by someone else, but also the fact that this comes after years of pressure for him to step down.

What exactly do you believe that this CoC addresses by the way? I am generally unconvinced that a CoC does anything positive at all, but what is it that you believe that it does?

Why do you think they were written by someone else?

His statement contained both UTF-8 and ascii quote chars. That is at least an indication that parts where written by someone else. At best this was a lawyer checking and providing feedback to his statement. At worst this was someone forcing him to write this.

It is also suspicious to me how this change was seemingly not discussed in any way prior and that it was a very sudden change for him.

Given his history, he doesn't seem like someone that is manipulable and I expect he has enough FU money and cred to not be coerced into anything unwillingly. Sometimes the simplest explanation is the best?

The way a CoC would work, I think, is hard to quantify.

Sure, it may mean that some folks rage-quit on principle, some will continue bad conduct and get themselves kicked out, some will subvert the intent of it one way or another.

But if a CoC is "successful", it will mean that gradually you'll start to see folks who were previously under-represented start to contribute. You'll see more diversity and less fear and loathing. Is that a worthy goal? Yes, for many.

His statement came very surprising after years of beeing a different opinion. He just changed overnight I guess? Also his statement contained both UTF-8 and ASCII quote characters which is at least an indication that this was not one person writing it.

"Worthy Goal" Has that worked anywhere in practice? Who is underrepresented right now and why? Do we know?

The type of diversity archived by a CoC like this is litteraly skin deep anyways and might cost you diversity of thought. We already see "wrong" think beeing excluded.

None of that is an argument for or against the CoC, though, is it? Just because something can be survived doesn't make it a good idea, does it?

> Linux will not be destroyed by a CoC that tries to be more inclusive even if there are attempts at abusing that CoC.

Also, apart from the fact that this isn't an argument in favor: How do you know that?

Also, how does it try to be more inclusive by declaring more behavior off limits? I mean, it's a set of rules that mostly specifies what you can be banned for. Now, you might also dislike those things that are declared unacceptable ... but that doesn't really make it more inclusive, does it?

And mind you I am not saying that being more exclusive is necessarily a bad thing, but I very much dislike this kind of newspeak because it seems manipulative to me.

Well, I guess it starts even in the CoC itself it you read it closely?

For example, it says "Examples of unacceptable behavior by participants include: The use of sexualized language or imagery [...]". That is codifying a very specific value, namely one of sex negativity. If you are sex positive, you are at risk of being labeled an asshole for that. (And mind you, that quote continues "[...] and unwelcome sexual attention or advances", so it is clearly in addition to what could be reasonably considered a neutral "respect others' personal boundaries" sort of "don't be an asshole").

Then, there is this whole problem of not considering people who have deficiencies of sorts with regards to social interaction, and it seems to me that that is very much part of the ideology. Try to read the kernel CoC from the viewpoint of an autist, and try to reflect on how included you feel from that perspective when you are essentially told "because we want to have a welcoming environment for everyone, we shun people like you".

And more broadly, not necessarily directly tied to the specific authors (I just don't know the specific authors well enough to be sure), occurrences like this come to my mind: https://www.berkeleyside.com/2017/07/21/kpfa-cancels-richard...

"Inappropriate" and "offensive" are so subjective that you could argue the "code" doesn't really codify anything, it just is a tool to use and to interpret as you see fit if you have the power to do so, while claiming that it's somehow a more objective judgement that you arrive at based on "rules that have to be followed".

Someone can be "sex positive" and believe that a public global all-ages quasi-professional environment isn't the place for it.

Which parts of the code do you think are unwelcoming to people with autism? Most that I know are neutral about it or are pleased that neurotypicals have started to recognize the benefits of explicit rules. I know of a couple of organizations where someone on the spectrum led the adoption of a similar code.

> Someone can be "sex positive" and believe that a public global all-ages quasi-professional environment isn't the place for it.

Well, yeah, sure. But someone else can be sex positive and feel like using sexualized language, can't they? I mean, I am obviously not saying that the CoC should say that everyone should be forced to use sexualized language. And the fact that you can be a sex positive person and still feel like sexual things are more of a personal thing for you, say, doesn't change the fact that banning people from using sexualized language is sex negative, does it? Some sex positive people feel like anal sex isn't their thing. Making a law against anal sex is still sex negative, isn't it?

If you don't feel like using sexualized language, sure, more power to you as far as you expressing yourself is concerned. And really, as far as expressing myself publicly I'd generally be among those, it's not really my thing, at least not currently. What I object to is the authoritarian style of enforcing a particular set of values that have no direct relation to the goal of the project. And even moreso if it's done supposedly in the name of "being more inclusive".

If you are suggesting that someone could be sex positive and think that sexualized language should be banned in a "public global all-ages quasi-professional environment", really, I don't think so. Sex positivism in a nutshell is the view that there is nothing bad or shameful about sex per se. It's a thing many people do and enjoy, just as many people do and enjoy eating ice cream (and others don't, and that's fine, too). If that's your view, I don't really see how you could go from there to supporting a ban on using related language, pretty much no matter what the context. Either you think sex should be a taboo or you don't!?

> Which parts of the code do you think are unwelcoming to people with autism? Most that I know are neutral about it or are pleased that neurotypicals have started to recognize the benefits of explicit rules. I know of a couple of organizations where someone on the spectrum led the adoption of a similar code.

Do they prefer rules over no rules or explicit rules over implicit rules? If there is a rule that is enforced against you anyway, it's probably better to have it spelled out explicitly (than to be surprised by the enforcement of a rule you hadn't picked up on). But that does not justify introducing any particular new rule, only writing down what's already there anyway. And even then writing down what's already there does not justify those rules, it at best creates the opportunity to reflect on the appropriateness of those rules, and to possibly throw some of them out for good. I would think the objection is to being held accountable to rules they aren't aware of, not so much to not having rules.

Also, I'd be curious how similar that code really was. For example, "other behaviors that they deem inappropriate, threatening, offensive, or harmful" is very much the opposite of "explicit". It's so vague that if you think about it you realize there isn't actually any rule there. The only thing that's really there is the "rule" that the maintainer gets to decide the actual rules on the spot.

Edit: As for something not actually being a rule, I think this is a good test: Could you possibly use it to defend yourself against an accusation? No matter what you did, you could never justify your behaviour by saying "What I did was not deemed inappropriate, threatening, offensive, or harmful by the maintainer(s)".

"Sex positivity" doesn't mean you have to view sex just like ice cream. Is it also authoritarian to allow only one of them in the office?

The people I know on the autistic spectrum understand that there are never "no rules". With respect to language like "other behaviors", they understand the concepts of loopholes and judgment calls. They also understand that the people in charge can always make new rules even if the rules don't say so.

> "Sex positivity" doesn't mean you have to view sex just like ice cream.

I don't think I said anything about sex being "just like ice cream", because that doesn't really mean anything. I specifically pointed to treating it as a taboo subject, and in that regard I would think the general consensus is that sex positivity implies considering sex to be just as non-taboo as ice cream.

> Is it also authoritarian to allow only one of them in the office?

Yes?

Just to remind you, none of this is about getting on people's nerves with topics they don't want to discuss or intentionally making people uncomfortable for the sake of making them uncomfortable or anything of that sort. This is about a ban on a certain kind of language, and only that particular kind. Isn't it strange that there is no ban on talking about death? Also a taboo for many people, also something you can make people really uncomfortable with, and also something some people don't mind. But for some reason, sex is banned explicitly, death is not.

> The people I know on the autistic spectrum understand that there are never "no rules".

I think you misunderstood my point. When I wrote "no rules" that was meant as "within a given scope", not as a global qualifier of "a world without rules".

> With respect to language like "other behaviors", they understand the concepts of loopholes and judgment calls.

The problem isn't the "other behaviors", it's the "deem[ed] inappropriate, threatening, offensive, or harmful". Those are highly subjective criteria. It's like writing criminal law that says "The judge can sentence the defendant if they don't like what the defendant did". And doubly so for autistic people, given that your best chance at avoiding punishment is to guess what the other person finds inappropriate, threatening, or offensive.

> They also understand that the people in charge can always make new rules even if the rules don't say so.

Which is besides the point. First of all, it's trivially true that people who do have power can use it, but that doesn't automatically justify their actions. But more importantly, none of what I wrote is about whether new rules can be made, but about the fact that applying new punishment rules retroactively is unfair, and that non-rules such as "[...] or to ban temporarily or permanently any contributor for other behaviors that they deem inappropriate, threatening, offensive, or harmful" are necessarily de-facto applied retroactively as the rule itself does not specify the offence.

Proper criminal law specifies in the law itself what the offence is and how it is going to be punished. The point is (a) that it's up to public consensus to decide what is punishable and what is not, not to some judge, and (b) you are supposed to be able to look into the law to find out whether what you want to do is forbidden or not. None of that precludes new laws being added. But you cannot be punished for things that weren't forbidden yet when you did them.

>Do you know who's going to gravitate toward projects with a Code of Merit instead of a Code of Conduct?

Who the hell chooses a project to contribute to based on its "code of conduct" (the notion which didn't even exist for much of history of open source)? I thought people write code to solve actual technical problems, not just to flame each other on the Internet.

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