I think this is an interesting line of thought but think we should take it further. These codes of conduct that focus of the feelings of third parties over the good of the project (the code) can themselves be seen as an attack on the project. They also often are imposed on projects via peer pressure and other social engineering methods. Perhaps we can use these codes of conduct and the people that push them as open examples of how projects can be infiltrated by those with different agendas and learn from them how to better defend against such attacks.
I'm not the parent poster, but will post anyway. I really don't want to get into this discussion, which is kind of ironic because the reason I don't want to get into the discussion is the very reason codes of conduct are purported to exist. It is very easy to become targeted and vilified if you happen to have a different point of view on the subject.
A very common clause in codes of conduct is that people who are identified with a project must uphold the code of contact when they are communicating, even when they do so outside the context of the project. Usually "identified with a project" is defined loosely enough that it can be used fairly indiscriminately. It has happened that people who voiced objectionable ideas outside the context of a project have been forcibly removed from those projects.
For some, this is a triumph of justice. For others (and I include myself in this camp) it is further fostering an "us" vs "them" viewpoint, vilifying those whose ideas differ. Interpersonal conflict is difficult and requires considerable skill to moderate. A code of conduct, while it can simply be a communication of the ideals that the project strives towards, can be used as a scaffolding to attack those who we disagree with and wish to punish.
It's insane that we might reach a point where people install different branches of a project based on their political leanings...
I think the main takeaway here is that a Code of Conduct, while valuable, has to be treated carefully. A lot of these projects agreed to a Code of Conduct just to appease a certain faction of their devs, and are now seeing that it can be used against them.
I found your perspective quite insightful, so thank you for taking the time to respond.
I believe the author represents a very valid sense of alienation and dismissal many people feel when a code of conduct appears on a project they may have worked on for years.
While I cannot speak for the author, I have had several conversations with people who hold views similar to that of the author in the past week thanks to current events. People are afraid. They see the Contributor Covenant and other codes of conduct and view them as at best a cudgel for exclusion and at worst a power grab by political groups they feel unwelcome with.
I'll be honest, when I first read this article I pretty much pumped my fist in the air, this is like a call to arms against those awful codes of conduct. So I may be so blind to the issues of the people who call for codes of conduct that it is in the 'unknown unknowns' for me. I just don't know about them.
The code of conduct push was a transparent game of social aggression — an attempt to shift open source power dynamics in favor of:
(1) Allowing social activists, who could not acquire institutional power on the basis of their own technical merit, to co-opt open source institutions for their own aims and to extract resources. See also the contributor covenant, DEI consultants, et al.
(2) Securing the necessary power structures to enforce the beliefs of their particular vein of progressive political activism.
In my experience being very involved with a few large projects that were pressured into adopting a code of conduct, the historically most toxic and socially aggressive personalities in the project became the biggest proponents of adopting a code of conduct, engaging in bad faith and with extreme social aggression to tear down any detractors, hiding behind their newfound righteousness as a defense.
I was with you until your last sentence. Taking you point at face value, people who despise codes of conduct nonetheless working under a code of conduct would just be another example of people disagreeing with each other (in this case disagreeing with people who favor the implementation of codes of conduct) and yet still being able to work together.
One could argue that the difference here is that codes of conduct are being enforced in a top-down fashion, that is, the people you disagree with are actually in the leadership of the project. But I can see how this argument could just as well be used to justify the value of codes of conduct.
FWIW, I've tried but I simply cannot decide if I'm ultimately in favor or against codes of conduct.
I suppose that's part of the reason I've had trouble understanding this phenomenon: the couple of "code of conduct" documents I've read have seemed so inoffensively obvious that it is hard to understand why such a document would be necessary, much less why it would be controversial. It alarms me that people care so much about them that merely expressing confusion about the purpose or utility of such a document acts as an invitation for criticism, and it reinforces my perception that these are not my people, arguing about something that doesn't concern me, and I don't want to get involved. I suspect that this is not what the people promoting codes of conduct are actually trying to do. I'm mentioning it in hopes that becoming aware that the harsh moralistic approach is alienating people who might otherwise support their project will help them do a better job, because it sounds like the overall effort is worthwhile.
Behavior outside a community should very little consequences inside of it. Of course there are some extreme cases where this might be a problem however those cases are extremely rare and should not generally be used for the basis of creating a Code of conduct or rule set
The wider political climate in world today is making have to be that simple.
While the article talks about more extreme cases like actual physical sexual assault, today far far far too many communities are using simple political disagreement and criticism and framing that as "harassment" using that "harassment" as method to remove any political dissenters from their ranks
I have seen it attempted (some times with great success) in several open source projects.
Personally I dislike the very concept of Codes of Conduct and I generally oppose most of the terms in many of the more modern Code of Conduct being pushed forward, likely as a result of my very libertarian political views. That said Codes of Conducts (should a community or project adopt them) should only be enforced based on actions WITH IN that community and/or toward people that are IN THAT community.
Not generalized actions of people taken in other communities with a different set of conventions and rules.
Code of Conduct should be seen as a contract of Behavior that all people agree to when voluntary associating with the community to treat all other MEMBERS of that community based on that code of conduct, it should not apply to conduct when interacting with people not a part of that community and thus never agreed to the code of conduct.
Owch, before this it wouldn't have occurred to me that a "Code of Conduct" would be crafted for the purpose of giving identity politics some leverage into open source projects, for twitter mobs to better harass developers. I would have taken the idea at face value - a codification of "don't be a dick".
They seem to have a twitter smear campaign running in parallel to bring in random people to pile on. Unless the dev has said something else, I can't see any hate from him (though I disagree with his view).
While some codes of conduct boil down to "just be nice", sometimes they end up encoding very specific beliefs of the people writing them.
For example, the code of conduct on dev.to [1] states that:
-------------
We pledge to prioritize marginalized people’s safety over privileged people’s comfort. We will not act on complaints regarding:
‘Reverse’ -isms, including ‘reverse racism,’ ‘reverse sexism,’ and ‘cisphobia’
Reasonable communication of boundaries, such as 'leave me alone,' 'go away,' or 'I’m not discussing this with you.'
Someone’s refusal to explain or debate social justice concepts
Criticisms of racist, sexist, cissexist, or otherwise oppressive behavior or assumptions
-------------
Note the "we will not act on complaints regarding [...] reverse racism". As someone who 100% disagrees with the idea that "reverse racism" is a thing (although I find the word dumb; it's just plain racism, nothing "reverse" about it) I have to ask myself: Does this mean the rules differ based on skin colour? Is something acceptable when said by a black user to a white user, but racism if it's the other way around?
It's things like these that, I believe, end up turning a "code of conduct" into a de facto political manifesto designed to keep out not only unwanted behavior, but also unwanted world-views. It's those codes of conduct that create direct harm.
My conspiracy theory, completely devoid of evidence, is that Codes of Conduct are a way for large corporations to gain control over FOSS projects they covet by creating arbitrary controversy aimed at the current maintainers of these projects. That's why CoCs are written very gray so they can be weaponized in different ways or not at all, depending on the level of coercion required. Corporations don't do this directly but through activists, some of whom are willing pawns and others who believe they're doing the right thing for the world but are actually being nudged into doing things that benefit the corporation.
But like I said, I have zero proof of this. Perhaps it's better as a screenplay than an explanation of how things are going but it certainly wouldn't surprise me if there's some truth to it, at least with some FOSS projects.
Isn't it the point of the code of conduct to put off troublesome people and to facilitate collaboration between contributors? Maybe it works as intended?
Don’t you think that the project owners are obligated to the code of conduct they wrote themselves? Why should I contribute if the project handles this way?
Are you serious or arguing insincerely? I can't tell.
Codes of conduct are a direct response to ongoing harassment and stalking against various contributors of various open-source projects, followed by inaction on the part of the project maintainers or the excuse of "that just can't handle criticism".
What is so offensive about saying "make it about the code, not about the person" and "don't stalk, dox, or harass people"?
A code of conduct is a signal that juvenile behavior won't be tolerated and that if your code reviewer starts sending you dick pics they'll get banned from the project. It doesn't do anything by itself - if the project maintainers don't follow through it is worthless but like security lights and door locks the signaling value has an effect on people's behavior.
The same is true of those other groups, but the goals and incentive structures are somewhat different there. The prevalence of codes of conduct in open source projects and relative rarity of them in other online groups suggests that there's some sort of difference in how people view them.
I'm going to get downvoted for this, but: I'm against code of conducts because they're worse than the problems they try to solve.
edit:
In my opinion, code of conducts become a distraction and a cause for worry to anyone contributing to these projects because someone inevitably gets their feelings hurt and points to some well-intentioned rule in the CoC to get the 'offender' shamed/removed even if no harm was intended.
Reminder that the Code of Conduct was also implemented as a way to inject entropy in open-source projects that are deemed a threat to the information control matrix sponsored by Eric Schmidt, Rupert Murdoch and Bill Gates.
Do you know who's going to gravitate toward projects with a Code of Merit instead of a Code of Conduct?
People who are ostracized by projects with a Code of Conduct.
Or, to put it another way, if you're a jerk and you argue with other contributors about an on-topic issue in a jerky way, then under a Code of Merit, you still come out on top as long as you're technically correct (the best kind of correct!), even if it leaves other contributors feeling put down.
Granted, there is some overlap. For example, both the Code of Merit and most codes of conduct disallow disparaging remarks based on protected characteristics. But the Code of Merit disallows them because they're considered irrelevant to the project, whereas codes of conduct disallow them because they're affronts to dignity.
I do take issue with many codes of conduct in the tech space, because I think they tend to be written in a bubble world where everyone assumes that everyone else thinks just like them, but a Code of Merit sounds like it's even more problematic.
reply