Re: [gentoo-project] Why should you *not* vote on existing Council members

[Rich Freeman]

Again, only speaking personally.  Also, on many of these issues we're
just going to disagree on what the policy is and how it ought to apply
- ultimately policy is up to Council.  Proctors just tries to apply
the little guidance that exists in this area and accept whatever
direction it is given.

I'm just replying where something hasn't already been said..

On Thu, Jun 27, 2019 at 1:23 AM desultory <desultory@g.o> wrote:
>
> On 06/26/19 08:36, Rich Freeman wrote:
> > On Wed, Jun 26, 2019 at 12:24 AM desultory <desultory@g.o> wrote:
> >>
> >> On 06/24/19 06:55, Rich Freeman wrote:
> >>> Speaking only for my personal opinion:
> >>>
> >> by
> >> your espoused reasoning even filing a bug requesting ComRel intervention
> >> due to demonstrable violation of the CoC would not be a suitable venue
> >> for arguably negative comments regarding an individual, as (per ComRel
> >> [ComRel]) there is no indication that such bugs would necessarily be
> >> private.
> >
> > There is also no indication that such bugs would be public.  IMO the
> > ComRel policy should define expectations of privacy because this has
> > been a problem in the past with Council appeals, which I believe I
> > have commented on the lists about previously.
> >
> So no ComRel needs to clean house in order to avoid running afoul of a
> new (unilaterally conceived) policy that runs distinctly counter to
> existing practice.

I was saying that ComRel needed to document expectations of privacy
back when I was on Council, which was a while ago, and long before
Proctors was restarted.

People share all kinds of sensitive stuff with Comrel.  It absolutely
should be clear whether they can expect it to remain private.  Having
heard Comrel appeals I can tell you what is wrong with the current
state.

A few witnesses share sensitive concerns with Comrel about some dev
with the understanding that it will be kept private (likely given by
private assurance). Comrel ends up taking action against the dev.  The
dev appeals to Council.  The Council gets a dump of all the evidence,
much of which is sensitive, and where promises about privacy have
already been made.  What does Council do?

Council could decide that we don't act on private info, but then what
was the point in soliciting it in the first place?  Also, Council has
good reason to think that somebody bad is going on, which they are now
ignoring.

Council could decide to uphold the Comrel action, and keep the private
info private.  Now you get the usual conspiracy theories about secret
cabals running Gentoo, and no official policies one way or another.

Council could uphold the Comrel action, and then publish the private
info.  Now you get people really upset about broken promises on
sensitive issues.

No matter what the policy is set to, somebody will be upset.  However,
we should still have a published policy.

This is why Proctors has a published policy.  Proctors deals with
stuff done in public on Gentoo communications media, on lists, bugs,
IRC, etc.  Proctors doesn't deal with stuff that happens in private,
anywhere.  Proctors doesn't accept private evidence - anything
submitted will go in a public bug.  Anybody with a concern about what
Proctors is doing can go search on bugzilla and see the same things we
see.  The most ephemeral stuff we deal with would be unlogged but
official IRC channels, but usually plenty of people have personal logs
they can look at for these, and even then we rarely get involved
because most are already moderated.

Bugzilla in general is within scope of Proctors.  We would generally
not deal with Comrel bugs because:
1. Comrel already has all the powers Proctors has to deal with CoC
issues.  We don't add value.
2. Most of these bugs are generally hidden, and stuff that isn't
public generally isn't our scope.
3. Comrel IS an appropriate forum for frank discussion of a lot of
stuff that would violate the CoC in public, so it requires a different
approach, which is what Comrel already specializes in.

> Which would make this yet another new policy spawned for no
> evident reason other than having not thought through the implications of
> an existing policy, and not bothering to consult with affected parties,
> again.

I don't hear Comrel complaining.  I'd be shocked if they had concerns
over what we're doing, and have a liason on our team for just that
reason.  It isn't like we make stuff up in a vacuum.

> > While it isn't Gentoo's policy I'd suggest taking a look at the FSF's
> > CoC.  It does a decent job (IMO) of explaining why personal attacks
> > are counterproductive even if you think they should be allowed, which
> > they are not (at least not unless Council says otherwise).
> >
> The most obvious problem with that is what was warned about was not a
> personal attack. There is a difference between "$person lack empathy"
> and "$person is an inhuman monster" which seems to have been lost in
> this action by proctors.

So, I think we're arguing over the definition of "personal attack" -
either statement is not appropriate on our lists.

And we certainly do make distinctions, which is why only a warning was issued.

> This is yet another occurrence of a fallacy which is distressingly
> common in various media: since one does not think that a system is being
> overly abused now, why should anyone be at all concerned about abuses in
> the system? Especially when that system is, in the instance in question,
> being abused.

If Council feels that our action was inappropriate they can take
whatever action they feel is necessary.  We enforce the CoC as we
believe it was intended to be enforced.  A few people have voiced
disagreements, which is to be expected.  That is why we elect Council
members.

All Proctors actions and bugs (whether action is taken or not) are
public.  Anybody can review what we're doing and raise whatever
concerns they wish, as you have done.

IMO it is a good system.  There will be disagreements, but I think
this is about as transparent a system as I can think of, and
suggestions for improvement are always welcome.

> It is entirely possible to make policies which are unclear, or
> inexplicit on some point, which are then taken, incorrectly, to imply
> something which is itself then made policy and enforced.

Of course.  And that is why we have the opportunity for feedback.  All
policies need refinement over time, and Council is the appropriate
place to bring concerns about the meaning of the CoC.

> There have been
> numerous personal attacks on the lists in the time since the proctors
> project was started (restarted, if you prefer), none received a warning
> for months, then a critique of how someone handles one of their roles
> was treated as an actionable violation.

True.  I do not claim that this was the worst violation since Proctors existed.

In general we avoid opening bugs every time a minor issue comes up.
However, we didn't open this bug.  Once a complaint was submitted to
us our options were basically to close it without action, or close it
taking some kind of action.  You might disagree with the decision we
made in this case, but IMO it was the right one.

I'm not suggesting that I want everybody to go opening up Proctors
bugs everytime somebody does something you don't like.  However, if
bugs are opened, we're going to follow our process to resolve them,
and we will generally do so quickly.  Over time I'm sure we'll both
get better at it, and people will become more used to how these are
being handled, and maybe we'll have fewer CoC violations in the first
place.

> I think that it is distinctly unrealistic to treat a personal critique
> as an actionable personal attack when personal attacks are regularly
> ignored by proctors.

So, you can't get out of a speeding ticket by arguing that the police
failed to pull over EVERY car that was speeding.  No CoC enforcement
will be perfect, nor is it intended to be really.  The goal is to
steer things in the right direction, and nudges over time will
hopefully get things going in the right direction.  This is why I am
emphatic that warnings should not be seen as reflecting on the
individual.  Getting a warning doesn't mean that you're the worst
person in Gentoo - it just means that you did something wrong, and you
should try not to do it again.  That's it, and if we actually heed the
warnings maybe it will be a nicer community to participate in.

-- 
Rich