Code of conduct

To summarize the discussions of these past weeks and my own thoughts on the topic (this is an updated version of a previous summary from last month):

  • On having a CoC or not, I think it is useful and the SecureDrop Community needs one. Its existence is a message to newcomers telling them there is an active effort to make them feel safe. The absence of Code of Conduct conveys the opposite message.

  • About the content of the CoC, I do not feel the wording is important as long as the spirit is good and the content Emmanuel and Heartsucker worked on look fine to me.

  • About the enforcement of the CoC, I think that the SecureDrop Community needs the following procedure:

    • Send encrypted email to X and Y describing the situation
    • You will receive an answer within 24h
    • A ruling will be made when X or Y have all the information they need
    • The ruling will be sent to you (in public if necessary) as well as the other people involved. It will include a clear and detailed rationale.

    It only has four steps and leaves a lot to interpretation. But going into procedural details, explicitly listing potential punishment etc. is potentially harmful because it creates a bureaucratic process that very few volunteers can deal with. It is also very important that the rationale for the decision is clearly articulated otherwise the people who rule may not realize they are biased; and the people who are targeted by the ruling may have no way to understand it.

  • Defusing tension is an on-going effort that is more important than the CoC and member of the SecureDrop Community who do that should be easy to find and appreciated.

  • The scope of the CoC is limited to the SecureDrop Community. It should be published or advertised on the website ruled by the SecureDrop Community, together with the list of people who are trusted by the SecureDrop Community to enforce it. It applies when an individual or an organization claims to belong to the SecureDrop Community. It does not apply to individuals or organizations who modify, use or distribute the SecureDrop codebase.

You have not substantiated why it is useful, where it has been useful, or why the community here needs one. You have met my claims to the contrary wrt. its implementation with no evidence.

What “problems down the road” are avoided if asked questions go unanswered?
You will start as soon as the CoC that is so adamant about it is instated. No, I don’t believe it holds such powers. Either the proof is in the pudding of a thread discussing its merits, or it isn’t.

What a CoC isn’t, and how you defend it, is by way of detailing a way to escalate matters.

The difference in the wording of “strive to” and “must” matters, because there is total exclusion with a zero-tolerance policy at the other end of this.

Not having a CoC does not imply lawlessness, that is not the current CoC-less situation, nor is the proposed CoC not superficial to current laws. So general and common, they can actually be described in such a sweeping notion. The defence of having laws, or in place for appeasement does not make them good laws. So the need is different, but the false security is the same in that comparison. If internal morality is not sourced from god(s), how do you manage to put yourself higher?

Conflict resolution is not a code on how to conduct yourself. Nor would I argume, good people need any external motivation for. The beurocracy of which is best kept at a minimum, sure, the logical extension of your concern is none. I like the opt in nature of reporting for it, a tangible working cyberocracy, in addition to what is a meritocracy in outcome of the resulting non-social aspect of the project.

How do you see determination of trust, other than by action, content of presentation or popular vote? In trying to change how social hierarchies work, you must account for both truly good and truly bad people. This does neither.

It applies when an individual or an organization claims to belong to the SecureDrop Community.

Reserving membership as a admission of entry is beurocracy. This CoC never had a community backing. The current community exists without it, and claiming it sees no activity because the community is small, is evidence to the contrary of popularity when the community that does exist outside of people discussing it, is comparatively huge. Self-representation and voluntary alignment are community values, unrepresentative representation is not.

It does not apply to individuals or organizations who modify, use or distribute the SecureDrop codebase.

The only way we see eye to eye on community is not dictating it.

So the you effectively decided you needed this for yourself, representing by example, “new users” and

What happened to people representing themselves, before you came to their aid by deciding they were marginalized?

Your concern for the governance of marginalized people, is marginalizing. They are powerless to escape your labelling, and are also dehumanized in narrowing their views down to being those of their observed groups.

Pairing meaningful diversity to gender and race is a tacid way of pushing the word “suffering” in front of you. It is the concession to the very focus you put on it. Whereas the neutral retort would be consideration of merit having no bearing on any external factor, you are left defending what “un-diverse” people aren’t bringing to the table, or why you removed agency based on gender and race in choosing to join such efforts.

A culture doing something for one group, or that group engaging in the culture of doing something, is in no way evidence of exclusion of another.

Or, do you include yourself in the supposed marginalization you claimed on part of others, or do you part-take in it in the way you imply happening? In which case you will have to distance yourself in a meaningful way from me claiming I respectively am not marginalized, and do not marginalize. Because marginalization loses its meaning if everyone is marginalized. Though you could buy into the victim culture of intersectionality, in my view a culture of making victims and barriers of people on outside of supposed victimhood, on equal footing to discuss among themselves.

As an alternative to that, an equal opportunity structure owes nothing to society at large. In assuming equity of outcome, you are implying guilt, on part of SD. I want no part in that.

If I were to conflate the remains of your argument to one central tenant, it would be you see the social aspect of being in the SecureDrop community fully superficial to the making of SD in how the CoC applies.

To that I would say, if the actual work that goes into it, and the code is not, and can not be represented by this CoC, why should the people that make SD and its community?

(Curiously here, one is free to freely associate based on arbitrary reasons to the development of free software. The only groups I have known to do so are the very pushers of marginalization. Paradoxical irony on every level. Otoh, to your credit in being male, you are engaging in the otherwise female-dominated field of CoC advocacy and writing. Where the inherent irony of exhibiting the supposed underrepresentation of “women in tech” could not be more stark. Please interject that this is not a field or people in tech, and I stand corrected.)

I am btw. of no illusion that purely social things never help development.

Otherwise, the ease with which one decides to be a member, does not follow in the lines of an imposed ruleset to do so. There is no logical corollary, what you have instead is a open door leading to a barrier explained away by it. Quite the opposite…

I don’t want to be part of any community that dictates this way. It is not welcoming, and would in my opinion reflect badly on me if I did.

  • why it is useful: I think it is useful because it is visible to newcomers and is a sign an active effort is made to make them feel safe.

  • where it has been useful: I feel safer when entering a Free Software project that has a Code of Conduct instead of not, this is where it has been useful to me. To be specific, the OpenStack community is a particular Free Software project where I felt safer because it has a Code of Conduct. I have been involved in OpenStack as an employee and volunteer during about four years, contributing code as well as organizing community driven activities (yes, I can’t help it ;-).

  • why the community here needs one: I think that the absence of Code of Conduct may be interpreted as a sign that the community here does not make an effort to make everyone feel safe. There are other reasons I can think of but if there was only this one, I think it would be enough.

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You can signal safety by presenting yourself, no need to represent others, or impose anything on them. Just signaling virtue or the implication of effort, is not actual virtue, nor actual safety.

What would change about the OpenStack community if it didn’t have a code of conduct?

If you fear your fellow man to the point of needing an extra reassurance that law is in place, in a way that suggests it is superior to it, then what you are describing is not the fear of a free software project.

You are creating fear by giving in to the fearful idea that a CoC-less community is one that can not be seen to care. The idea that a community out to hurt anyone, could not also instate a CoC, is in line with antisocial behavior. The idea that someone might think something, is of a wishful sort.

If you can’t help it, nor can a CoC. I am glad your propensity isn’t community driven lynchings :slight_smile:

If you want to attract people such as yourself, remind yourself of how you got here without a CoC in place. Otherwise stand up to your wishes of having a CoC with your own need.
If you want to attract less central figures, such as myself, creating a community outwards, in which you can rise to the top by merit, let me be an actual voice of denouncing its absence as an effect on me doing so.

People make free software, the freedom of people make free software. You don’t tell people how to conduct themselves. Hacker culture is based on an ethos, and a manifesto that you may or may not aspire to.

This statement is not acceptable to me. Underrepresentation of women in tech can hardly be contested. And when I read “female-dominated field” it sounds like you are claiming that CoC advocates deliberately exclude male participation, which is not only contrary to my experience but is also an accusation of gender discrimination. Maybe what you had in mind was different from what I read?

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I contest it by numbers saying the people that advocate for its presence in tech, join social advocacy and policy-making, not tech. Not that the two are mutually exclusive, but in this sense they are.
To me I sound like I didn’t say that at all, because what i did say was:

A culture doing something for one group, or that group engaging in the culture of doing something, is in no way evidence of exclusion of another.

That is an accusation of gender discrimination, but I didn’t make it. You didn’t read me engaging in one, because I didn’t write such a thing. What happened was I wrote something different from what you interpreted.

What field of free software is not open to any one person punching endlessly far beyond their weight? I will give you the bulk and bloat, where one can apply oneself by tenacity, but nothing that is truly special.

You would first have to prove there is an identitarian exclusion policy or practice in place, and second of all either stop saying women do the same things because they are alike if you use “representation” that way, or allow for the incredible talent of any one of them to outweigh anything and anyone else if you don’t. In which case the ones that do, don’t need you to imply they are underrepresented in this fashion.

I can state that I for one was surprised when I started working on SecureDrop development in 2016 that it did not have a Code of Conduct given the project’s stature. This was a negative in my opinion, but I decided to work on SecureDrop anyway because I felt particularly passionate about the project goals. Perhaps there are others, given many interesting projects to choose from, who selected another project to contribute to instead of SecureDrop. This would be a shame.

If projects like this one are to maintain a healthy and professional working environment, I think that a Code of Conduct is a critical step in the positive direction, building on all the excellent progress so far bringing in a diverse set of people who have contributed a lot to the project so far. As such, I strongly support the work done by @dachary, @heartsucker, @edenemmanuel, @eloquence, and others in working on the Code of Conduct.

In my view, a Code of Conduct is a statement of very basic professional norms. If people think that the items contained in this document are not necessary to state as they are obvious, I can assure you that there are many people for which that item is not obvious. For example, I might assume that the discussion of sexual content being totally unprofessional and inappropriate is obvious, but even in this thread there is disagreement on this point. If there are further questions regarding why a Code of Conduct is important, I recommend this excellent Code of Conduct 101 FAQ: https://www.ashedryden.com/blog/codes-of-conduct-101-faq :slight_smile:

Perhaps we should see if the broader community likes the current draft? It might be best to start a new thread with a poll.

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Very basic professional norms are already norms, they are already evident.
What is the disagreement?

We don’t settle our differences or answer any real questions by having a CoC.
One just points to it, in the state it exists, and forego having to discuss anything. Evidently not even the establishment of the very stature that forbids “Posting sexually suggestive, explicit or violent material.” is up for discussion.

With it in place, it forbids “Advocating for, or encouraging, any of the above behaviour.”

So any contention is shut down by default.
I don’t see how a vote is superior to debate?

I read the 101, and it answers none of the questions I had, leaves me none the wiser as to what you thought about them, or it in general. What I derive from having read it is an unmixed bag of feelings. But it could still be that I don’t ‘Get it’. What I did get was this:

Not everyone understands what is unacceptable behavior, especially when we are talking about a group of people that is mostly homogenous and has very little interaction with people different than they are.

Homogenous societies are the least violent. What is more evidently less acceptable than that? This is thereby a genetical argument without backing. It discriminates, ironically against the specific homogenity of societies that invented, and are the best at all the liberal points in this CoC. Not even if you substitute for “likeminded” is that a valid argument.

We focus specifically on what isn’t allowed and what violating those rules would mean so there is no gray area, no guessing, no pushing boundaries to see what will happen.

This is not how you develop as a human. Should you lack in any part of this development, being an antisocial person, reading a text is not going to help you. One would think that the author reflected over this, having just penned a critique of not being able to learn about people in any other way than interacting with them.

Human interaction is too complex to be written down as a functional ruleset. Trust is the basis on which egalitarian society hinges, not fear and navigation of semi-law. It is a very basic misconception that any unwritten rule you could write down helps its end. That is not the culture in which they came to be, the culture of what they are, or the culture of how they are made.
In no way are we in any sort of culture that we can liken ourselves to in seeing any benefit from it.

Then the 101 says “be excellent to eachother has a poor track record”. linking to Google Workspace Updates: New community features for Google Chat and an update on Currents

It’s consensus-driven political process means that any major changes to the space that go beyond its typical “doocracy” have to be put up for consensus, a system in which a single member’s refusal to agree can shut down an otherwise popular request. The consensus process is one that is not conducive to much in the way of governance, though this is of course generally viewed as more of a feature than a bug; it ensures that the space remain true to its anarchist roots.

This is exactly how the UN parliament works. The worlds nation states think this is a workable concept, but not not political agenda, and the blogs he links to.

The situation at Noisebridge has gotten so bad (alongside other issues such as dirtiness and homeless people living in the space) that long-time members went so far as to put in a proposal that Noisebridge seek to terminate its lease[1], presumably to then rebirth itself at a new location with tighter access control.

This is what nation states are. It is also every other place than an anarchist collective.

My experience is people don’t follow the CoCs they write themselves, and pull rank whenever convenient. It is most convenient when wanting to instate one. You earn that by meritocracy, and the right to fork is reserved for anyone to keep that honest. The value of merit can be thrown away at an instance.
There is a lot of wishful thinking that goes into CoC, and it here covers imaginary scenarios derived from what looks like fear. If you fear the community and humanity itself, then you have lost. The CoC is not how to engage with people in a meaningful way.

Why one would resort to voting ones way out of living with people that engage in sexual misconduct is beyond me. Short of physical altercation, this is what police is meant to deal with. Fast approaching checks and balances here.
One is left to think, if only they had a better CoC… Surely they would listen to a bulletpoint that says:
“Unwelcome sexual attention.” meanwhile busy somehow working towards “excellence towards other people” without it, by way of sexual misconduct.

It was all interpretation wasn’t it. What they needed was “focus specifically on what isn’t allowed and what violating those rules would mean so there is no gray area, no guessing, no pushing boundaries to see what will happen.”

It wasn’t that the new CoC that did it. It was the people that did. They did the right thing by pushing a piece of paper in front of them. Solving the problem, but seizing to be the anarchist community they were or wanted to be.

Example: “in a positive way” is an interpretation of censorship that reserves the right for oneself, but also to police others. It is precisely the sort of vague passive aggressive CoC language that sounds nice, but actually proves sectarian.

More-so than the mental arbitration of delineating a social hierarchy into societal function.
If you don’t have hierarchy, you don’t have social function. I could get into chaos-theory here, but I really like the horizontal approach of the SD community pre-CoC.

If it is already law, writing it down has already happened. If you think someone in your social sphere is confused as to the very basics of it, post the law for all to see.

"By using an already established policy, you don’t have to worry about how it will stand up if and when it’s battle-tested. " somehow managed to be relevant instead of wholly misguiding.

Wishful CoCs don’t change actual people.

Are you a worse person for having operated without a CoC? Did it influence your way of engaging with other people?

So a CoC is deemed professional? Are all other historic enterprises, short of the Mafia and Catholic church unprofessional. Why now? If it was bad then, why would it not be bad now, somehow the belief overpowers all concern. Was it good for FreeBSD, or LLVM?

So the invented user sees a CoC, does that user actually read it. Does it actually need to have anything in it? Professionalism for the sake of professionalism is best served in the purely esoteric realm. Why not put a tie on it I say, a tie says professional.

The Linux kernel got a small CoC in 2015, it doesn’t feature any bloat, moralism, logical flaws, etc.

Half of it is how to get help if things should, or have gone wrong. The rest is how to avoid that by focusing on what is important. and it closes off with a nice saying.

And then it got appended into Merge tag 'cc-4.0-rc2' of git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/gregkh/char-misc - kernel/git/torvalds/linux.git - Linux kernel source tree

It gives some insight into how things actually work, and why. Great.
It is called a “Code of conflict”. Which is a very zen play on words. It “signals” to me that someone gave it some thought. I like that. These are real hackers. I put some trust in that. And from reading it, it seems they believe in their ways.

Linus doesn’t believe in professionalism.

RMS evidently doesn’t either, demanding to have satire discriminating against passive aggressive bureaucracy reinstated.

Where Linus doesn’t care for professionalism, there is a most reverse professionalism about RMS, but nontheless the same professional tenacity in achieving a goal, together they are instrumentally important in the creation of the two most important free software enterprises there are. Enter the anti-authoritarian ESR into the fold, having written the cathedral and the bazaar, and you truly have three different sorts of people, all with an overlapping goal of making free software.

I don’t know if it is my perceived diversity, my other contributions to this project not amounting to much, or my work to improve this CoC that puts me into the “and others”, or not. I don’t know.
However I would much rather take the honesty.

Free software used to be a shared ecosystem, the Internet used to be a place where you could talk to anyone about anything.

Imagine for a second the new user is instead Linus, ESR or RMS. They wouldn’t last with a CoC that treats conflict as a bad thing, limits speech, values content over context, etc.

I think a poll would indeed give everyone in the SecureDrop Community a chance to tell if they are in favor of the idea of having a Code of Conduct or not. This discussion went on for weeks and it became clear there will not be a consensus.

Where was the discussion, here?

I see no little to no evidence of that, short of “I had long discussions with their community manager”

I don’t know what kind of clarity you want to reap from a vote that you can’t do better by arguing the case? This is what a discussion is.

How do you poll your way into a functional CoC?

A vote without discussion is one where I would opt for the option that most closely resembles “no”, or “more discussion needed”.

To quote from this thread:

The points it contains meet the agreement of a large number of people who built communities that are sustainable."

Sustainable communities much bigger than this one operate without one. Communities much bigger than this one lose developers as a result of bad ones.

What I have seen here is a defence of a response code as the basis of the defence of a CoC, and

“Strive to” sounds like it’s a recommendation. It’s not. The behavior expected of the community has some MUSTs and MUST NOTs, and I think the language needs to properly reflect that.

Which is actually follows:

“As mentioned before, I think the Rust CoC2 is something we should model after because it is very clear and precise about what behavior is or is not acceptable.”

But it actually is pleading. “please avoid” and round “Respect that people have differences of opinion and that every design or implementation choice carries a trade-off and numerous costs. There is seldom a right answer.” “strive”, etc etc.

Where it though is clear “We will exclude you from interaction if you insult, demean or harass anyone.” this person would have been excluded for their interaction in this thread.

Otherwise without any clue as to what it is beyond what boils to thinking it is useful, beyond proof, with fictional adopters to vouch for it:

“I think it is useful and the SecureDrop Community needs one. Its existence is a message to newcomers telling them there is an active effort to make them feel safe. The absence of Code of Conduct conveys the opposite message.”

“Why it is useful: I think it is useful because it is visible to newcomers and is a sign an active effort is made to make them feel safe.”

“why the community here needs one: I think that the absence of Code of Conduct may be interpreted as a sign that the community here does not make an effort to make everyone feel safe. There are other reasons I can think of but if there was only this one, I think it would be enough.”

" I can state that I for one was surprised when I started working on SecureDrop development in 2016 that it did not have a Code of Conduct given the project’s stature. This was a negative in my opinion, but I decided to work on SecureDrop anyway because I felt particularly passionate about the project goals. Perhaps there are others, given many interesting projects to choose from, who selected another project to contribute to instead of SecureDrop. This would be a shame."

As to what is a step too far, all of my concerns about it went unanswered.
In my head the most amount of meaningful diversity represents the broadest amount of functional arguments, by actors of good faith. And I give everyone a chance, and then some to get there.

There are historically many bad CoCs, with no near end in sight.
So my contention is that one loses diversity worst case, by alienating people with a bad CoC.
Unless diversity is somehow a question on the basis of racial makeup, broken into percentages.

This presents to me a fanatical and irrelevant idea of what constitutes a good community, and it is one where people don’t answer themselves what they are, but are rather divided on the basis of grouping them by for example race, gender. Or, as with Drupal, sexual proclivities.

This view was presented in

“I recommend this excellent Code of Conduct 101 FAQ” in a biological view that attemptedly deprived homogenous groups the idea of understanding what acceptable behaviour is. I find it utterly reprehensible to misrepresent biology in this way. On a philosophical and ethical level it is an external imposition of moral, which I refuse to accept. The nature of the argument leaves room to be downright irrelevant, to which it must be said to fall to its own construed implication of its own making.

And the breakdown of what constitutes diversity broken down into at-least gender and race here:

“Open Source has always been a foundation of the Internet, and with the advent of social open source networks this is more true than ever. But free, libre, and open source projects suffer from a startling lack of diversity, with dramatically low representation by women, people of color, and other marginalized populations.”

How free software is somehow systematically misogynist and racist is beyond me, but not my control. I only look at text when i review the work of others. I let them in based on the quality of their work.
Granted I will have seen the nicknames before then, but I am fully onboard with anonymizing those if it means more people to do the work. Everyone can read this post only for the quoted content it displays. If that makes any actual difference to anyone, I think the problem is theirs, and I won’t have my community tarnished on the implication that it needs it. Point to the evidence and make the change there. You run a numbers game on what you deem to be the problem, show me the numbers on what power is wielded the other way.

I must say I really like the SD effort to democratize the process, and lower barriers on replicating the work.

Free software used to be a place where it didn’t matter what race you are. If you want to come to a very non-racist place, I can recommend it, and open the gates to all the channels i control with open arms. If you feel unjustly grouped into a label of marginalization, I will take your side any day.

Sadly you will find lately find race constantly invoked in CoCs, this is no longer a place where you can just forget about all of it. We serve people of colour at this water-fountain, specifically, not just one for all.

@kingu I’m going to try to address what you said.

Correct me if I’m wrong, I think you believe this to be a sleight of hand where I’m jumping from “defender of abuser” to “rape apologist” on the grounds that sexual_abuse != rape. I think these are sufficiently equivalent to make that claim. Read the “River” story on http://jacobappelbaum.net. That is non-consensual sex. Non-consensual sex is rape. Ergo, Appelbaum is a rapist so one who defends him is a rape apologist.

And if you’re wondering why I take such a hardline stance on this, most women I know (over 3/4) have been raped. I’ve seen what this does to them. I don’t want that happening to other people, and I go out of my way to take such an aggressive stance because I feel not enough people do.

This isn’t attacking her character. This is stating that given her history, we should not consider her opinions on the matter just s we shouldn’t listen to what BP think about environmental protections.

I mean, yeah. I think there is. CoC’s seem to often be opposed be abusers and casual misogynists (not imply anyone in this thread is any of those things, for the record). And CoCs help mitigate the threat pf abuse.

As an anarchist, I put minimal faith in the law and legal system to adequately map to morality.

A judge in Canada is facing removal from the bench for his conduct when he asked a woman in a rape case why she couldn’t “just keep [her] knees together.” (link)

Especially as folk who work on the edge of what the law permits (and certainly goes counter to their interests), many of us are not the type to go to the police when something happens. We have to decide for ourselves what is acceptable and what to do.

I feel like you’re implying that I’m willfully being misleading or slanderous and would backtrack once called out. Or that I don’t have knowledge of these people that isn’t public that may differ from yours.

Yes. It does because so many communities have these kinds of people, and having a CoC either forces them to keep their behavior in check or roots them out, both of which I support.

This feels like security nihilism. Because we can’t keep out some extreme cases, we might as well not try?

I used to think that, but then I remember that people’s words can be traumatic or can incite violence, and now I think otherwise.

Related to the above, if we don’t kick out the people who say heinous things (for some definition of heinous) their very words will drive others out. What is the bigger harm? To let one person stay because we can’t exclude anyone or to boot them to let many others stay?

That’s not what it says. The CoC is aim to create an atmosphere for getting shit done. I am among the most liberal people when it comes to sexuality and could have endless discussions about it with people outside the context of SD. Sexuality is fascinating. But. I can also recognize that many people do not want to be faced with it for many different reasons.

We’re not treating people as children. The CoC is saying: people come from different places with different experiences, and we want to minimize accidental or intentional hard to we can get as much done on SD as possible.

Sure, you can’t know someone into until you ask or hint, but this is a professional activist community. Forums and chats aren’t a place to pick up other devs.

“We” are the community. You, me, the other contributors, etc.

It’s preemptive. We write one so if something in the future happens, we have a way to deal with it.

My existence disproves this. I have been a member of the community since 2015, as a volunteer and never officially part of FPF. I back this CoC.

Being an ally to marginalized doesn’t inherently dehumanize them. We’re not saying everyone is a delicate flower that needs protection. We’re saying “maybe there’s only one, but let’s be gentle to accommodate.”

And there’s a whole lot more I could respond to but it’s getting late I have a birthday to attend. I’ll try to get back to the rest later.

There is a sleight of hand here,

Correct me if I’m wrong, I think you believe this to be a sleight of hand where I’m jumping from “defender of abuser” to “rape apologist” on the grounds that sexual_abuse != rape. I think these are sufficiently equivalent to make that claim. Read the “River” story on http://jacobappelbaum.net. That is non-consensual sex. Non-consensual sex is rape. Ergo, Appelbaum is a rapist so one who defends him is a rape apologist.

And if you’re wondering why I take such a hardline stance on this, most women I know (over 3/4) have been raped. I’ve seen what this does to them. I don’t want that happening to other people, and I go out of my way to take such an aggressive stance because I feel not enough people do.

What I actually said was

this
    Could you clear up this matter?

Jake Appelbaum is most certainly an abuser (see so many stories), and defending him makes one a rape apologist. The author of that post (the same one cited in the article) has publicly many times defended him.

There is a sleight of hand here, from alleging someone is an abuser, to the defense of said persons other characteristics, to necessitate defense of said abuse. To that claim you have produced no proof. Critiquing said defense on its own merits is another matter, and unless you can find proof to support your claims, what you have engaged in is libelous defamation.

You further dismissed a critique of CoCs on account of stemming from the person you deemed to be a rape apologist. This is an attack of character.

Failing to demonstrate why, implying a conflict of interest on part of said person, even guilty as far as you are concerned, one would think there is some sort of causal connection between sexual misconduct and instating a CoC.

Not a chain of command and handling of information, but the very implicit nature of policing people, where the law is already clear. Splitting it up and starting out by instating ones ideal without the enforcement. That it stems from a select few integral developers, and pertains to be for the community, really begs the question of who it represents, and for what reasons.

They are not mine, and as an irrelevant contributor, i respect your meritocratic authority to enforce it, but don’t hide it from me in plain sight.

The reason it is not something I, or I imagine others, are too happy to get into, is because it seems sanctimonious. You are one of very few people, to discuss such matters privately.
I understand it is not in effect still, but as such a person, I will still hold you to it.

Your position here is not on a continuum of either being against or raising support for victims of rape. It is an ad populace imposition out and inward of morality that enforces you in applying injustice to others.

I do not count you out of these victims, because your sympathy seems well founded, but unsupportable.

There is no defence of ioerror in the critique of the CoC.

Furthermore, the person making it, never defended abuse, actually, to the contrary.

Your logic here would make me a rape-apologist by extension. To be clear, I defend a persons right to have an opinion about CoCs without being called a rape-apologist, and i demand evidence to that effect, based on its altercations alone.

I am a defender of the onus on extraordinary proof for extraordinary claims. To which you still have presented none.

If 3/4 of the women you know have been raped, your immediate surroundings has a huge problem, i still account for that as clouding judgement. It is actually worse than anywhere I know of. I would hope you could find and focus on something to mend the situation and prevent these from happening in the future.

What your aggression amounts to, is drawing other people, some of which have been raped, into it.

It does not make it better on anyone, and by asserting and assigning blame where no blame is due, you are extending what could have been a reasonable critique of an extended problem, into a discussion where it does not belong.

I hope I can get you to see that there is a time and a place, and that I will listen to it.

You further dismissed a critique of CoCs on account of stemming from the person you deemed to be a rape apologist. This is an attack of character.

This isn’t attacking her character. This is stating that given her history, we should not consider her opinions on the matter just s we shouldn’t listen to what BP think about environmental protections.

This extends what is an attack on her character into an incitement of forever enacted reprisal based on it.

If you don’t consider someone’s opinion, you have left out all recourse of
them actually changing, were they to have regretted an earlier position.
What you do here, is assign blame towards someone who has no history
(that you have pointed to thus far) of excusing rape.
She left the Tor community by her own admission she says. I don’t think she has a dog in the game.

It is different from BP having a vested current interest, and historical attempts
behind it at covering over environmental disasters.

I will listen to BP when BP makes sense. If the powers to be do well, you will
have refused to listen on account of some paternalist, no, not in the male sense,
idea of what people ought to do in your view.

one would think there is some sort of causal connection between sexual misconduct and instating a CoC.

I mean, yeah. I think there is. CoC’s seem to often be opposed be abusers and casual misogynists (not imply anyone in this thread is any of those things, for the record). And CoCs help mitigate the threat pf abuse.

Where are fewer people raped as a result of a CoC? Where are people less capable of rape as a result of a CoC?
The mere idea that someone is capable of abuse, but incapable of silently accepting a CoC, is unfathomable for me. Who are these CoC-abiding abusers we are showing the door?
That sure isn’t the stated reason why people leave communities that instate a CoC, so they must have some sort of moral imperative not to breach the CoC, but feel the need to cook up solid evidence and reasoning to bring down CoCs as they do, instead of accepting this openly.
It is a very ambivalent relation to have with CoCs.

where the law is already clear

As an anarchist, I put minimal faith in the law and legal system to adequately map to morality.

The law also applies to you. You also have the option to support defamation,
charater-assasination and libel through other means, even general murder openly.
If you want to say rape isn’t adequately presented in law, I am all ears.
If you think the mere notions of beginning to rule out or penalize
these behaviours through law are unjust, I will still listen, because that presents a
fascinating position.

“A judge in Canada is facing removal from the bench for his conduct when he asked a woman in a rape case why she couldn’t “just keep [her] knees together.” (link)”

A person has his legally extended power removed, because he can’t behave
according to law. Sounds like a win for the law.

To present a neutral view of knowledge, we don’t know that his work up until then was good. I will give you indices that it wasn’t. The idea that he was able to claim to power is a hypothesis
in need of evidence that there is a systematic leniency not to either educate,
test or vet people, and I will listen to that if you present it.

Especially as folk who work on the edge of what the law permits (and certainly goes counter to their interests), many of us are not the type to go to the police when something happens. We have to decide for ourselves what is acceptable and what to do.

You have played that out of your hands when any reasonable person would. Which is the exact same premise most people call the police on.
I don’t see people charged with their every offence once they do, which is the premise of people wanting to call the police. Maybe they undermine that elsewhere. Again law.

I gave you the opportunity to not double down. Entertain the idea that I know exactly what you know about what isn’t public knowledge, then defend your position as if i didn’t.

I feel like you’re implying that I’m willfully being misleading or slanderous and would backtrack once called out.

As for misleading, I don’t know that you don’t see it the way you present it. Mens rea a concept of establishing intent. You seem confused to me.
So confused about something to me very simple, that it makes you seem more so. This has been my reasoning in dealing with it.

Noun

slander (countable and uncountable, plural slanders)

"A false or unsupported, malicious statement (spoken, not written), especially one which is injurious to a person's reputation; the making of such a statement."

I am not implying it, I am presenting it in the context of that definition. Without proof, you can’t call people rape-apologists and not make yourself guilty of slander.
This is true till you present such evidence, or alternatively denounce the statement.

Or that I don’t have knowledge of these people that isn’t public that may differ from yours.
This is not the fora to compare notes. I can’t say Dalai Lama is a war criminal publicly for privately held positions.

Has it then been a problem to the point it needs pointing out?

Yes. It does because so many communities have these kinds of people, and having a CoC either forces them to keep their behavior in check or roots them out, both of which I support.

I don’t shy away from dealing with things directly. I won’t change because a CoC tells me not to.
I support your ability to wish for community being more outwardly pure than that which could include ESR, RMS and linus. It doesn’t mean the endeavour is not unfruitful or morally rotten.

It is a false security, because it lacks empathy with people one ought to not feel sympathy for.

This feels like security nihilism. Because we can’t keep out some extreme cases, we might as well not try?

It feels like security nihilism to you because you think it matters. What you describe looks like defeatism to me, because i think it is not related to actual security.

Apply your hacker mentality to thwarting this CoC to the purpose of your own benefit. You are welcome.

I wholly disapprove of what you say and will defend to the death your right to say it.

I used to think that, but then I remember that people’s words can be traumatic or can incite violence, and now I think otherwise.

This critique was presented towards a book in which a rational and consistent argument was presented. On the merit of words alone, and the emphasis you put on limiting their use, I find your argument less so consistent. What brought us the enlightenment was this very concise rationality, and i think you will find it prevented violence and led to a decrease.

I think you will find rolling back on this is the best gift to forces that don’t believe in it, some of which are violent enough in nature to rule out the mere consideration given the chance.

I used to believe in exposure therapy, and I still do, because it is a recognized psychological form of treatment. How you go about that is important, crucially in not trying to rule it out.

Incitement of violence is illegal. We still have freedom of speech. You could disagree by extending it, but not by shrinking it. I never claimed you have to be for it, I am saying that is what it is.

Allowing free speech doesn’t magically flip a switch that lets all types of speech go without consequence. Actions have consequences. One of which is limiting speech. That is a magical flip that imposes restrictions on the one tool we have at our disposal to settle our differences in a verbal manner. In its ability to censor, it creates subcultures of it, and gives a great argument to positions held within those, that otherwise would have none.
You limit speech, you lose.

Exclusion by exclusion is not compatible with inclusion.

Related to the above, if we don’t kick out the people who say heinous things (for some definition of heinous) their very words will drive others out. What is the bigger harm? To let one person stay because we can’t exclude anyone or to boot them to let many others stay?

Related to the above, you are fine with having such people, so long as a CoC supposedly keeps them from acting on it. It changes nothing about current bad behaviour to kick someone out.
I think justice should be reformative. The bigger harm that does change people is alienating people to society in a repetitive fashion. That creates monsters.
I never said you couldn’t exclude anyone. You believe in free association based on speech, I do too. That is how good ideas take form and promulgate. I am not of the opinion that if someone in my community says something I then have to agree with it.

I am of the opinion that if you create rule of inclusion based on not having these beliefs, and create rules to that effect, you have neither anarchy, nor the good sides of it.

So sexuality is deemed immoral or unwanted now is it? How humane is that?

That’s not what it says. The CoC is aim to create an atmosphere for getting shit done. I am among the most liberal people when it comes to sexuality and could have endless discussions about it with people outside the context of SD. Sexuality is fascinating. But. I can also recognize that many people do not want to be faced with it for many different reasons.

Joke joke, danger danger

The unshameless plug is the butt of a joke I won’t make. It reflects too well on myself.

And here we are discussing sexuality, like the humans we are. Who are these people that want to rule out discussing sexuality…?

I would argue this discussion is how to prevent abuse, and to form the basis of consent. I don’t think the topic will come up ever often, but I do think treating it as a taboo because it might does it no favours.

If you treat people as children, they behave as children.

We’re not treating people as children. The CoC is saying: people come from different places with different experiences, and we want to minimize accidental or intentional hard to we can get as much done on SD as possible.

It doesn’t actually say that, you did. But in saying so, what have you communicated and what perceived effect do you think it will have? Meanwhile I wasted time presenting unanswered arguments regarding this, in line with and contrary to the stated goal.

This is not how sexual attraction works, which in no way is an excuse of sexual abuse.

Sure, you can’t know someone into until you ask or hint, but this is a professional activist community. Forums and chats aren’t a place to pick up other devs.

Maybe they aren’t very catered to it, but what do you think to exclude by enforcing it, other than human nature? The CoC applies to all venues of the SD community btw.
I think that extends to the very real physical meetings. In the consensual expression of mutual attraction between adults, how is the SD community hurt by that?
You use the word professional, but in a way that doesn’t mean paid workers, nor used in a way that supports excluding behaviour that is illegal to rule out in a professional setting.
I find it hard to reconcile your view with how you are to determine “Unwelcome sexual attention.”

It doesn’t change human nature, and you treat people like non-humans by pointing it out.

“We” are the community. You, me, the other contributors, etc.

You answered on part of someone else there. I found the non-sequiteur to be the statement that just because we agree on a CoC, that people trusted to handle it should be designated.
The capacity in which “we” is invoked there, is really pressing.

why the community here needs one.

It’s preemptive. We write one so if something in the future happens, we have a way to deal with it.

What is it you can’t deal with that you need a CoC for? If it was pre-emptive it wouldn’t happen, or I take it to mean dealing with something means you have to establish a doctrine first.

The legal aspects there you can just apply to law for.
As for a code of reaction, or “escalation practice” sure, saves valuable time and lays things out clearly. Meanwhile you cant monopolize action taken directly, or through outside means.

This CoC never had a community backing.

My existence disproves this. I have been a member of the community since 2015, as a volunteer and never officially part of FPF. I back this CoC.

Granted. I salute your efforts.
I wanted to not represent a community by a select few people in it, myself included, as it is not representation worthy of their participation. This is the only impetus i need for collaboration.

What happened to people representing themselves, before you came to their aid by deciding they were marginalized?

Being an ally to marginalized doesn’t inherently dehumanize them.

This is not contested. Though who asked for allies? If you declare someone as a cause, that is now their plight.
Saying “marginalized groups, like women and people of colour”, decides on part of someone else as a premise of not belonging to said group,
Wrt. the above, still if you do. I believe in the full representation of people, in the capacity they wish. Broad sweeping statements about derived status based on gender and race, leaves room for well founded concern. Just because it sounds like well-meaning concern, does not make it so that everyone has to accept what you can argue to be an unfavourable label.
I think the way out of the culture of victimhood is to fight the culture that surrounds it.

We’re not saying everyone is a delicate flower that needs protection. We’re saying “maybe there’s only one, but let’s be gentle to accommodate.”

I don’t like being encompassed in the we, but that is beside the point.
What if you don’t want to be singled out? You are saying, there is one, it is this one, and the mere redundancy of bringing up a special problem relating to it, in a saying that encompasses all, (and rightfully should) is unwarranted.

And there’s a whole lot more I could respond to but it’s getting late I have a birthday to attend. I’ll try to get back to the rest later.

Congratulations on the birthday, on your part or extended to someone else, I hope you have fun. :smiley:

Hello everyone,

Apologies for not being an active participant in this discussion until late.

In this community, and in many communities, we should strive to be welcoming to new members. It is really heartwarming to see new contributors from all walks of life, contributing from a wide variety of skills.

Much like @redshiftzero, I feel strongly that a Code of Conduct would allow contributors to feel comfortable in joining the project. The long-term success of a project depends in part of its ability to attract sustained contributors.

A CoC is in part a statement of values of the community, setting essential social norms. While some might feel that its redundant to state norms that should be completely obvious, I can tell you from first hand experience that, in terms of social norms, what is obvious to one may not be obvious at all to another. This is true when we’re talking about people from a similar culture background, and becomes more the case when we’re dealing with a worldwide audience, with people from different backgrounds and walks of life.

Lack of communication about what our expectations are as a community dramatically increases the risk of breakdown, and thus decreases the long-term viability of the project. I would feel safer if there were a clearer explanation of what we expect in terms of social interactions. So would new contributors.

There seems to be mostly a consensus of starting a poll to the greater community to see if we want a Code of Conduct. I propose creating a poll and collecting responses over a period of time, announcing it to various channels such as Gitter.

2 Likes

I agree with @edenemmanuel. For the record, I strongly support a CoC for SecureDrop. I suspect there is broad support for this within the SecureDrop community, and a poll will help us establish whether this is true.

I suggest we kick off the poll next week, and then decide the best way forward based on that data. There’s always the fallback option of Freedom of the Press Foundation organizationally establishing a code of conduct for spaces where we have some specific responsibility (e.g., the freedomofpress GitHub repositories, events we organize, etc.), but I think a unified SecureDrop Code of Conduct that also lets us spell out responsibility of organizations more narrowly (FPF and potentially others in future) is a better way forward, and I’m optimistic that we can reach agreement.

1 Like

I will create a poll now.

1 Like

I have created a thread for collaboratively writing the CoC here

Chiming in. Some points I’d like to address:

Re: Bringing up Linus, ESR, RMS. If anyone has ever spent time in the linux kernel dev mailing list (I haven’t checked it out since 2006 and ran away from it as fast as I could back then so it may have changed), you know it’s an Olympic flame of a dumpster fire. I don’t want that for us. Other foss projects (thinking Ghost.org, P5.js) have a diametrically opposite culture in the conduct of their participants (and have the boundaries of allowed conduct codified–cool concept) and are producing great foss products. I can point to basically anything involving Linus, ESR, RMS and say “definitely not that, please,” and point to anything involving Hannah from Ghost or Lauren from P5 and say “more like that.” A code of conduct by itself does not get us there but it sets the trajectory towards the direction I’d like to see us head into. It was their first step towards a welcoming, inclusive community of developers (not an abstract ideal; P5 and Ghost have already accomplished this) and it can be ours too, if we take this first, preliminary, basic step.

There was a similar discussion around forming a CoC for the hackerspace I’m a member of years ago. The concern (from only one person, for the record) around the CoC was that it wouldn’t actually stop an abuser from ignoring it.

They’re correct.

Enforcing the CoC is what would stop an abuser from ignoring it, and this is where we’ll have to make sure we follow through on our promises. That shouldn’t stop us from making them to begin with, and that shouldn’t stop us from having a convenient first-stop document for new contributors to get an idea of what sort of behavior we like and what sort of behavior we don’t.

4 Likes

Closing this thread now that the discussion split in other threads to vote on the existence of a Code of Conduct and the writing of the Code of Conduct.

That is a step too far. This thread got locked without answer. Which was promised.
And there is a lot to answer for.

Starting in the wrong end, and calling that a discussion, when it is a working-group for implementation that otherwise didn’t need its own thread, is evidently not a discussion when what to put in it is limited down from what the original scope of discussion was.

IB4TL, there was this in the chat: (names redacted)

Summary

Y:
Jun 02 15:40
btw y’all, I’m reopening the discussion about the CoC here: Code of Conduct, creation and collaboration
Jun 02 15:49
apparently @3 created a vote on the CoC like… right before I opened my post I didn’t see it
apparently we’re both feeling motivated about it on this lovely summer day :grin:

Me:
Jun 03 06:48
@Y Moving on from whether it should exist to changing its form as it exists, only makes a logical leap out of the obvious. An impetus to explaining away why it exists as a concept, begs the question of why it exists in this form, and what observable characteristic is it trying to replicate. Among other things.

Y:
Jun 03 13:32
There’s two threads on this right now. Loic’s thread about "should one exist at all " and mine which is “should it exist at all, what form should it take”
I think enough people have expressed interest in having a CoC that there will likely be one, and I think the why has been addressed in a number of ways so further explaining here would be repeating myself and what others said.
but
In short, a CoC is necessary because social norms aren’t obvious and the infosec/tech/activist spaces have seen more than their fair share of abusers cause problems and force people out, so we’re preemptively doing this to ensure that at least our little slice of the world takes active measures to protect marginalized people and victims of harassment.
You have brought up concerns about the exact language of the CoC and how it’s enforced, and I started the thread to try to move the discussion towards building a CoC that addresses the many needs of the many different members of the SecureDrop community

Jun 03 13:38
As we move towards a final draft of the CoC (which again, is assuming we all vote that way), if you want to prevent overly broad language or remove ambiguity, your critiques are welcome

Me:
Jun 04 14:24
I just want to put myself in the mindset of someone who thinks this is a good idea, that it helps, or that this is a honest way of going about it. None the wiser.
Why don’t we need overseers that can make sure any communication is deemed OK before anyone ever sees it?
In my view, you are letting abusers dictate your ways, in ways that don’t prevent, but actually empower them. For reasons why signalling virtue is deemed appropriate for ad populous reasons.
Social norms are called unwritten rules for a reason, they are extremely obvious. If you lack this basic upbringing, a textfile is not going to help you. However other things might.

Jun 04 14:29
Just shutting people that have trouble, or otherwise problems reading into or behaving in socially acceptable ways, is a network effect that creates monsters.
In practice, the language used is full of illogical, moralizing and other problems. Chief among which is having to know social norms to read into them their intended meaning.
I could think of no worse way to facilitate people with for example Aspergers, or other types of autism. That is the unintended audience here.

Jun 04 14:35
Why did we end up here? The process of instating a CoC is clear as mud, but it was not by having a CoC. I am not saying it was by not having a CoC, but it is a more likely scenario, as it is time tested.
The act of change is just as likely to have any of the negative effects observed in communities that have instated them. Show me data on avoiding harassment or over-representation of abusers/abusive behaviour.

Jun 04 14:40
I have many problems to bring up about the effects of CoCs, but they are fairly secondary to arguing the above.
There are actually three threads now, and there is no reason yours couldn’t have been in the first. You did however strictly make the opposite impossible. A vote doesn’t dodge debate any better.

O:
Jun 04 15:40
hey @me - i understand where you are coming from - having a list of rules won’t solve the problem of harassment completely and may have unintentional consequences. At the same time, the status quo at tech conferences is problematic. If you don’t agree that the current status quo at tech conferences is problematic … nothing I say or do will convince you further. While personally as a lanky white dude I find CoCs silly I understand that they are important to others and they present an image of here at securedrop events we do not tolerate assholes which makes some people feel more welcome. I’m not going to stand in the way because they are super important to others in the community. I think an alternative avenue here is for you to propose additional ways to make the SD community more inclusive. At this point the CoC seems like it’s going forward - you can either make it better or propose something else. Not trying to be a dick but this debate is counter productive at this point. I don’t want to read anymore walls of text about how the CoC is going to lead to the breakdown of civilization. it’s super boring to me and I want to get back to coding.

M:
Jun 04 15:43
In my opinion if we have to ask if we want CoC, means we already failed.

A:
Jun 04 15:47
@M what did we fail?

M:
Jun 04 16:06

@A Asking that question about if we need a CoC, that should not be a question.

A:
Jun 04 16:07
Well, it’s kind of against the CoC to assume everyone agrees with me so… :wink:

M:
Jun 04 16:08
hehe, I am not saying you did anything wrong, but, as a community we should not ask this question.

(M here in great personal difficulty, so take that into account.)

What troubles me isn’t the abhorrent disregard for ones own rules, it isn’t the logic implied or utilized.
It isn’t my admin rights silently removed, ad populist arguments, forcing the issue, or anything else.
What troubles me is silencing dissent.

You leave yourself without a voice to speak out. I am not afraid, but what does it matter?
Nevermind following any of it, or ensuring nobody is clever enough to abuse it,
you don’t have anyone to do anything about it.

To paint a picture of where my sense of honour commands me, you all sat idly by when someone brave enough to share her views was called a “rape apologist”. Dachary, I give you the benefit of the doubt, as you voiced unpleasantness with the ordeal.

I will sit idly by as you write your CoC, when it is published, I will critique it. The person whose questions you didn’t answer beforehand. I will have had nothing to do with it, as my suggestions for what to put in it has gone on equally deaf ears.

My reasons for not offering a critique on a more general level is i feel at this point that would miss the mark, and also

You turned Code of conduct into a flamewar. Could you please stop? This is disruptive. It does not bring anything of value to the debate.

Was sent to me privately.

Edit: This post was moved here from a thread I created when it was locked.

This is the reply from that thread:

A:

@me

TL;DR: please stop opposing the Code of Conduct, this is disruptive and drives people away from the SecureDrop Community.

If you think that is what my intentions are, you are wrong. If you think brushing over the fact that calling someone “rape appologist”, is disruptive, in a thread discussing a code of conduct, breaking completely with its suggested rules, is welcoming to anyone, you need to question what the SecureDrop community is. I do that, and I question the CoC. I am respectful, mindful of how the work is used in a global context. I keep it to one channel, and collaborate openly, to reduce redundancy.

I decide to take a different approach, inform others of it, as early as possible, and do not try to take away transparency by my forms of communication, and actively have invited another person to this discussion. Short of her not showing up, for reasons aforementioned in her critique, my approach is to stand up for people.

I try to resolve my differences in a constructive manner, and entertain the viewpoint of whoever I am debating, to see things from their position. I ask for help in this capacity, in what I consider an appropriate forum.

As for “and any violations may impact your ability to participate in the SecureDrop Community”

what did I violate?

I added this post as a reply to the closed Code of conduct thread because it is related.

Yes it is. And then you closed the thread it came from.

I understand you are opposed to the existence of a Code of Conduct. I think it is fair to say that most of the two month debate in the the Code of conduct thread is about your opinion on the matter.

No, and I think you will find I never disagreed until pressed, recently. As stated, I withhold my general critique on the matter, because I feel it misses the mark, it is secondary, for not only secondary reasons, but secondary to those even, are the concerns i consider my own.

Many members of the SecureDrop community took time to debate. It became very large and drove away some people. It also upset others.

I don’t know that any of this is true, but lets say it is, what are you trying to say?

Out of respect for the diversity of opinions a poll was created, solely to give you a chance to oppose the existence of the Code of Conduct. While this is understandably upsetting to some members of the SecureDrop community, it would be wrong to silence your voice and pretend there is consensus when that is not the case. Not surprisingly the vote result is in favor of the existence of the Code of Conduct and the work on its wording was resumed.

Your poll does not represent a diversity of opinions, it reflects a binary choice, of “yes” to it, or “no”. There is no middleground. With the thread permitting the discussion of its very existence (this) locked… The work was resumed in a thread I could already read, and was created at the same time, that limited discussion, I see no point in re-iterating asked questions there.

It comes as no surprise, because what I saw in this thread was more than not, expressing agreement univocally, without following it up by arguments that I find express anything more than that, and at no extent can satisfy painting a broader picture, or any at all.

If you keep opposing the Code of Conduct despite the desire of the majority and keep participating in the writing although you oppose its very principle, you will:

I don’t keep opposing it. I oppose it only when left with that option. What I oppose is stifling dissent. Censorship.

drive SecureDrop Community members away
upset SecureDrop Community members who are working on the Code of Conduct

It is in my book not what the letter of the law says, but primarily what you do about it and yourself that governs the world. What have I done to upset anyone? What has been done to drive people other than myself away from this community?

I am kindly asking you to accept that the SecureDrop Community feels differently than you do on that topic. I know your intentions are not to disrupt the SecureDrop Community but in my humble opinion this is what you are doing.

Speaking broadly on behalf of the SecureDrop community, is not something I don’t do.
Merely being against a CoC when questions are met with silence, is not disruptive. Do explain what you think I do wrong.

P.S. You did not have admin rights on the forum. You had rights allowing you to edit the topic of the translation category. It is now possible for such a topic to be in wiki mode and you still have rights to edit it.

OK, my bad. I apologize.

Edit 2: The thread I made critiquing the handling of dissent, which was closed, was actually de-listed and moved to a different category, with this message by the mod in question:

A: This topic is marked Unlisted so that the discussion can continue but is not prominently displayed on the home page because it is upsetting to some SecureDrop Community members. The post was also moved from the General category to the Site Feedback category for the same reasons.

Unlisting something is not something that fosters discussion, but lets entertain the idea that something in it is so upsetting to some SecureDrop community members that they don’t want to see it anymore.

It was closed within the hour, then re-opened, and de-listed 2 hours after that, so it must be gravely offensive.

Now the problem of not stating an actual reason, is I don’t know the difference. Willing to entertain the idea, but my reasoning goes so far as to think raising some questions is uncomfortable.

In my head that is sometimes the case when said question coincides with a question that needs asking. While I can’t further conflate that with “disruption”, I did, and will take the opportunity I have to do so. And will continue to do so given better options. Questions about a CoC is water under the bridge for me, what one does is important, and I stand by my firm position of asking
where the proof is of the claim that someone is a “rape-apologist”.

If that is upsetting to read about, I think it is no less valid, and can only imagine how it feels to someone targeted by it.

I think the question is interesting to the greater community too, and really do not intend for any harm done, keeping with the original wording is a measure to preserve for clarity, exactly what was said, and defended.