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Richard Stallman Announces GNU Kind Communication Guidelines (gnu.org)
AmiMoJo writes: Richard Stallman has announced the GNU Kind Communication Guidelines, an effort "to start guiding people towards kinder communication." The Guidelines differ from a Code of Conduct in that it's trying to be proactive about kindness around free software development over being rules with possible actions when breaking them.
These new GNU communication guidelines can be found at GNU.org along with Stallman's commentary. From the guidelines: A code of conduct states rules, with punishments for anyone that violates them. It is the heavy-handed way of teaching people to behave differently, and since it only comes into action when people do something against the rules, it doesn't try to teach people to do better than what the rules require. To be sure, the appointed maintainer(s) of a GNU package can, if necessary, tell a contributor to go away; but we do not want to need to have recourse to that. The idea of the GNU Kind Communication Guidelines is to start guiding people towards kinder communication at a point well before one would even think of saying, "You are breaking the rules." The way we do this, rather than ordering people to be kind or else, is try to help people learn to make their communication more kind. I hope that kind communication guidelines will provide a kinder and less strict way of leading a project's discussions to be calmer, more welcoming to all participants of good will, and more effective.
These new GNU communication guidelines can be found at GNU.org along with Stallman's commentary. From the guidelines: A code of conduct states rules, with punishments for anyone that violates them. It is the heavy-handed way of teaching people to behave differently, and since it only comes into action when people do something against the rules, it doesn't try to teach people to do better than what the rules require. To be sure, the appointed maintainer(s) of a GNU package can, if necessary, tell a contributor to go away; but we do not want to need to have recourse to that. The idea of the GNU Kind Communication Guidelines is to start guiding people towards kinder communication at a point well before one would even think of saying, "You are breaking the rules." The way we do this, rather than ordering people to be kind or else, is try to help people learn to make their communication more kind. I hope that kind communication guidelines will provide a kinder and less strict way of leading a project's discussions to be calmer, more welcoming to all participants of good will, and more effective.
. . . This ISN'T The Onion?
Most codes of conduct now are being used in the same way political correctness is: to prohibit certain types of thinking, forcing everyone to think in the ways that are left, which conveniently benefit one group attempting to take over what's left of Western Civilization.
Having a positive goal like this, and basing it on civility and not political alignment, is intelligent. It nurtures rather than censors.
Alternative Right.
What makes Rich-shart Stallman any more of a moral authority than the twitter team at Steakums (tm) or the good folk at Firestorne Tyres (tm)?
He is not any more or less of an expert than those people - and that's the whole point.
What he is is human, and fundamentally, deep down, all humans know how to be kind.
Ideas like these (not rules) help guide someone to remembering what it means to be kind, that other people are generally trying to be kind also and to remember that as well.
There will always be some outliers but the point is to at least try, if you don't take a first step you'll never get anywhere.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Only if the SJWs call off their social justice war. Or if the 80% of the rest of us who oppose political correctness decide to stick up for ourselves and stop being pushed around by toxic bullies.
Only if the SJWs call off their social justice war. Or if the 80% of the rest of us who oppose political correctness decide to stick up for ourselves and stop being pushed around by toxic bullies.
Or you could start acting as the bigger person instead of reverting to threats and childish three-letter-acronyms to belittle people who have opinions you don't like.
RMS manages to explain the goals of people concerned about things like diversity really well. His footnote about genderless pronouns is really good too, taking it as written that a person's gender identity is their identity but also showing how what matters is respecting that, not the exact words or conforming to some arbitrary standard.
I'm always impressed by his ability to think and write clearly, getting to the heart of the matter in a concise way.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
Two of the least kind people out there are pushing for codes of conduct? And this isn't being forced upon them by SJW's? Yeah right...
You know as well as I do that "SJW" is a term made up specifically to group people you don't like and dismiss them en masse. But sure, deliberately pretend I mean the number of letters if it makes you feel better.
The problem in rhe geek community these days is that it has been infested with people who took advantage of our refusal to reject anyone, abusing the system to bully and bullshit whoever they wanted without fear of consequences. And like many victims of abuse, we meekly complied to keep the peace when we should have kicked them out.
That needs to change. The incels and manchildren have had decades to prove that they won't change without enforcement, so it's time to bring in enforcement. There will be some initial pain, but the communities will ultimately be better off when the abusers are gone.
It seems that parents are no longer teaching their children how to behave in public.
Obviously this didn't start last week, because a lot of the offenders have been out of the house for a long time.
Lately it seems that it's become so prevalent that we need some (more) remedial education.
ESR's essay is instructive to people who want to participate in geek culture but don't yet know the social norms therein. It seems lately that the prerequisites for participating in any culture at all--starting with recognizing that dignity in others and in ones self are missing.
The grumpy old man in me suspects that society is crumbling and this is a doomed attempt to patch it.
The hopeful old man in me knows we have been assholes to each other for a long time and enough of us are fed up that all of are starting to hear about it.
This kind of self-discipline by communities is a messy process, but it really does seem like it's worth a try.
"Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away." - Philip K. Dick
FTFY
That is incorrect. "Their" is plural of his/her/its. We know his sex. Their is NOTHING wrong with using the correct pronoun that corresponds with his known nature - It is the suppression of doing so that is becoming the insane norm.
Maybe this is a 'Only Nixon could go to China' moment for civil behavior.
I mean, if freaking Stallman can admit that it is time to be civil, then maybe everybody can make the same assessment
There's nothing wrong with being civil, and even Linus in his most inflammatory periods would agree (even if he's violating them). The CC and CoC-enforcement community wants far more than a minimal definition of "civil", and that's the rub.
RMS's statement seems quite reasonable, because it basically boils down to:
Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.
That's a much better foundation for a conduct agreement than the course listing at your local humanities department.
Hire a Linux system administrator, systems engineer,
White people have nothing to be ashamed about
Yeah, that's not the issue.
But it becomes an issue because you can't even say it. For example there are various pride organizations for every ethnicity, sans white. Why can't we have a white scholarship? It's an obvious double standard and it undermines anyone who is calling for equality. The failure to perceive this obvious double standard is why I feel like most left leaning types lack logic. If you're interested in fairness of outcomes tie it to the well established metric of income, not the dubious metric of race. To tie affirmative action to race is to promote racism and says that Obama's two daughters need help while some poor white kids from the Appalachian mountains don't. Tying affirmative action to economics is actually trying to achieve something closer to fairness instead of trying to balance the racial scales regardless of fairness.
...They were designed to remind the people demanding equal rights that they were not equal...
Much like how colleges, and the left, demean the hated white male at every chance while promoting others.
Do Chinese Americans still face a lot of problems stemming from history? You know, given that Chinese were effectively slave labor in the late 1800s, or that most Americans were blatantly racist against Chinese people for the better part of two centuries? Actually no, they don't. That's because victim culture isn't part of their ethos. If you go back far enough we are all "descendants of slaves", or something equally as bad in one form or another. The Irish came to America to escape starvation and were then exploited. It was not uncommon for (white) women and children were effectively worked to death in textile mills in the 1800s and early 1900s. How are their descendants doing today? Do they blame all their problems on things "stemming from history"?
Slavery is over. It has been over for over 150 years. It was a terrible time in history, but guess what.. there are lots of them. Communism tortured, killed, and dehumanized millions of more people and is celebrated by the same people who support affirmative action and repatriations for slavery. How about, instead of blaming our current problems on long-dead generations past, maybe people of all races and backgrounds should be held accountable for their actions in the present?
But it becomes an issue because you can't even say it. For example there are various pride organizations for every ethnicity, sans white. Why can't we have a white scholarship?
Here's the thing: there IS scholarship of German-Americans, and Irish-Americans, and Italian-Americans, and various other Americans of European descent, and that is a perfectly legitimate and worthwhile endeavor. If there's some particular European culture you come from, go for it, have some pride, put on your lederhosen or clogs or kilt and celebrate the grand traditions of your forebears. Nobody will give you a hard time about it.
If, however, you aren't trying to celebrate any of those cultures in particular, you are going to have a hard time, because of these issues: If you want to celebrate white pride, what, in precise terms, are you trying to celebrate? Who gets to be in your white pride march? Is the criteria the color of your skin? Is it that you come from Europe? Or specific parts of Europe? How about Mexicans, whose ancestors come from Europe as well? Many Jews are light-skinned and had ancestors in Europe - do they get to be a part of it? Who is it, exactly, that is included as "white"? And, more importantly, who is it that is excluded?
Well many of us prefer "Toxic Unintelligent Regressive Douchenozzles" but it just doesn't roll easily off the tongue and the acronym while apropos tends to get filtered or butchered by autocomplete so SJWs will just have to do.
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.