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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.
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.
It's interesting that a bunch of ideas seem to be floating around the same time now about improving communities - that article yesterday on the monastic code of conduct for SQLLite, this ideal from GNU, and also an article I read recently on Weaponized Empathy - the kinds of behaviors you want to lock out of communities as soon as you see them to keep them healthy.
It seems like between the three ideas you could build up pretty solid community and moderation guidelines that would really make for a lasting peace and a great place to hang out on the internet.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
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
No matter how kind you think you are, German children are kinder.
"What is the difference between a Ponzi Scheme and an Investment Bank?" -- Jon Stewart
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?