Code of Conduct

I agree, i misunderstood thinking that you wanted it to be linked to here from the site.

Heres another coc for comparison too: https://www.drupal.org/dcoc

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should probably be participants or members

We had a brief dicsussion about this at the Webarchitects management committe today and there were some questions that arose.

Has “sex” been left off this list intentionally?

What exactly is understood by “sexual characteristics”?

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Good call… Reading the sentence as “… avoid [stuff] that encourage discrimination related to… sexual orientation, sexual characteristics…” I would say that “sex” in this context would not be sufficiently explicit; “sexual orientation” covers a preference (or lack thereof), while “sexual characteristics” cover physical attributes. Does that make sense?

In the UK there are laws making sex discrimination illegal in some circumstances, intentionally leaving “sex” off the list could be interpreted as a intent to challenge this legal situation?

Would a voyeur engaging in lecherous behavior count as an expression of their “sexual characteristics”?

I think it would be simpler and clearer if “sexual characteristics” was deleted and replaced by “sex”?

I don’t think this example is relevant to behavior that encourage discrimination but rather falls short of respecting Rejection of Sexual Harassment. Although I would rephrase: “We understand sexual harassment as unwanted sexual attention, including unwanted physical contact…” to ensure it’s very clear.

Unsure what to say about UK law. There’s clearly no “intent to challenge this legal situation” and anyone reading these lines and concluding to this interpretation would be very pervert IMO.

Sorry my example was a poor one.

If the intention is not to discriminate on the basis of “sex” why would there be a problem with adding “sex” to the list of things not to discriminate against?

I’m no legal expert but I believe that this the current UK list of “protected characteristics”:

It is against the law to discriminate against anyone because of:

  • age
  • gender reassignment
  • being married or in a civil partnership
  • being pregnant or on maternity leave
  • disability
  • race including colour, nationality, ethnic or national origin
  • religion or belief
  • sex
  • sexual orientation

https://www.gov.uk/discrimination-your-rights

I guess you have to ask the people at IFF who chose to write it this way. I have no clue otherwise than the interpretation I shared above.

Webarchitects has no relationship with the IFF, we are members of the Librehoster network and we are being asked to sign up to this code of conduct so I think it is appropriate to raise questions about it here?

Sure, but I think it would be more effective to ask the source since they seem to have chosen their words carefully otherwise. Maybe they will tell you that indeed it does not make sense in this case, or maybe they’ll tell you they used the Spanish legal terms… But I exhausted my own capacity to answer this question, that’s why I’m suggesting to contact them. Now, of course, we discuss it here, so someone else might come up with a better suggestion.

A better phrasing might be, to address @chrisc criticism:

We avoid comments, actions or propaganda that encourage discrimination related to gender, gender expression, race, ethnicity, religion, sex or sexual orientation, sexual characteristics, physical appearance, disability, or age.

Similarly, a better phrasing might be:

We understand sexual harassment as unwanted sexual attention, including but not limited to unwanted physical contact or insinuation of a sexual nature, as well as displaying images, drawings or visual representations of any kind that objectify members of any gender or reinforce oppression. The only exception is if this is part of a session, workshop and/or educational experience where showing these images is educational in nature.

I have no issues with adding “sex” (even without removing “sexual characteristics”), although I would not consider “pregnancy” as any of those, and therefore we would have to add to the list ad infinitum until we bump into a contradiction that forbids us to do something we would rather not do. Do you think adding “sex” would be enough, or should we also add “pregnancy” and others from the list you pasted above?

Would this list then cover all legal case in all countries? During the meeting I voiced against such lists, exactly for this reason :slight_smile:

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Yes, that would answer my main concern.

I have no problem with adding sex either, but I do not really understand what sex means related to sexual characteristic, maybe this is because I am not English, and from my cultural view sex refers either to the organs or to the intercourse… I think the problem here is that we all speak in a very dominating language, and all have different cultural approaches to what sex is.

Have we resolved all concerns raised? Can someone summarise what the actions are if not?

Should I mark the changes in this post: Code of Conduct?

Makes sense to me! :fire::fire::fire:

OK. I integrated the changes.

Here’s a poll in order to see whether there are still concerns not addressed. If you’re fine with the text in the first post of this topic, simply “Adopt the code”, if you still have a strong objection, “Reject the code” below and please explain why in a reply, so we know what concerns are still not addressed. The poll will close automatically the day before next online meeting, so we have yet another closed point to skip at the meeting!

    • Adopt the code of conduct as written in post #1
    • Reject the code of conduct (please explain why below)
    • Abstention

0 voters

The content is good and the points are relatively clear but I would reword some of the phrases so they’re easier to understand before finalizing the CoC.

Will happily review what ammendments you have!

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