[Haskell-community] Civility notes (was "Traversable instances for (, , ) a b")

[Simon Peyton Jones]

Friends

I second what Tom says below.

Almost everyone expresses their views with respect, even when disagreeing.  The exceptions are (in my guess) mostly unintentional, at least in the extent of the offence caused.   That does not make them unimportant, because a slow slippage in our collective standards is, over time corrosive.  But it does mean that we can draw breath, as Tom has helpfully done here, and without condemning anyone reset our standards.

I’ve been talking to a couple of people about whether it would be useful to have an explicit Haskell Community Code of Conduct.  Many online communities have one (e.g. Rust<https://www.rust-lang.org/en-US/conduct.html>), and it might be helpful for everyone to have a concrete baseline rather than an unwritten standard.  Any views on that?

Simon

From: Libraries [mailto:libraries-bounces at haskell.org] On Behalf Of Tom Murphy
Sent: 02 April 2017 19:18
To: Fumiaki Kinoshita <fumiexcel at gmail.com>
Cc: libraries <libraries at haskell.org>
Subject: Civility notes (was "Traversable instances for (,,) a b")

Hi Fumiaki!
     I agree with you that some poorly-chosen words by a few people have soured this conversation, but please don't let that turn you completely off of the productive conversation most of us are attempting to have! I think it's largely been successful, too: even if many of us haven't changed our -1/+1 votes, I for one have had my ideas challenged and have a more nuanced view than before talking with everyone here.
     Henning and Edward are two examples (one from each side of the +1/-1 chasm) who have been aided by this discussion, in making important progress to finding a middle ground (each in the form of proposed compiler changes).
     To the rest of us: Fumiaki regretting having posted here is a pretty stark example of why speaking politely matters. People being scared away and feeling unwelcome is a real phenomenon, and we need to do our part to fix it. I'd propose:

     - If you haven't read it already, SPJ recently wrote a heartfelt letter on the subject [0]. We've gotten better since then, but clearly we're not finished.
     - Civility is a norm, and norms sometimes need to be enforced. From a distance, we all look bad (and unwelcoming!) if anyone is hostile and we don't make it clear it's not acceptable. Speak up! That said, everyone makes mistakes - try to give people space to apologize and move on.
     - If someone says something insulting to you, please take that as a sign to become more polite, not less so. The downward spiral is real.

     If you're called out for saying something regrettable (again, regardless of if you're +1 or -1 on this issue), *please* take our desire for civil conversation seriously. Responses like (I'm paraphrasing, and not trying to cite anyone specifically): "It was a joke (mostly)" and "It's your fault if you didn't get the joke" are worse than not writing anything at all. Ideal would be a quick "Sorry!"
Thanks, all!
Tom

[0] https://mail.haskell.org/pipermail/haskell/2016-September/024995.html


On Sun, Apr 2, 2017 at 12:11 PM, Fumiaki Kinoshita <fumiexcel at gmail.com<mailto:fumiexcel at gmail.com>> wrote:
The discussion has diverged to flaming due to a few offensive people. I guess I shouldn't have posted a proposal here, I should have submitted a patch instead.

2017-03-23 19:53 GMT+09:00 Fumiaki Kinoshita <fumiexcel at gmail.com<mailto:fumiexcel at gmail.com>>:
It's surprising that they are missing (forgive me, I'm not here to make people grumpy).


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