from Hacker News

Code of Ethics

by eklitzke on 12/6/23, 9:22 PM with 21 comments

• by pyuser583 on 12/7/23, 1:59 AM

  > we subsequently learned that "Code of Conduct" has a very specific and almost sacred meaning to some readers, a meaning to which this document does not conform

  My favorite in-person programmer group was disbanded over a purely theoretical debate about the Code of Conduct.

  About 30% of the group decided we were being exclusionary by not incorporating very specific, and in my opinion exclusionary, language.

  However the same 30% had no problem attending a reconstituted group containing exactly the same people which formed a few weeks after the first group disbanded.

  The new group has no code of conduct. It simply meets in places that have a preexisting set of rules, and we go by whatever they are.

  Problem solved.

• by x-complexity on 12/7/23, 3:21 AM

  CoCs, in their most fundamental form, are vectors for language & behavioural control. People who desire to control the language & behaviours of others will be drawn to occupy such positions of control, whilst those that don't want said control due to personal beliefs will not seek out such positions. Overall, their existence creates structures for authoritarian influences, as well as mechanisms for ostracization & self-censorship.

  No person should ever be in charge of it.

• by grungyneer on 12/7/23, 5:49 AM

  This is a great Code of Conduct and anyone who follows it will be a great person. Its also great that it doesnt have a bunch of enumerated punishments and mechanisms, just a call to goodness.

  In general, I wish there were a wider variety of CoCs. Yes I can be super nice, but it might be nice to work in a team that is brutally honest with each other and takes nothing personally. I have the stomach for it and, if someone else doesn't, they don't have to participate. Of course such a CoC would be excoriated by the mob.

• by lifthrasiir on 12/7/23, 6:34 AM

  Even before this, SQLite was already famous for having a blessing in place of a legal notice in its LICENSE file (which I really like and have adopted for my public domain works):

      May you do good and not evil.
      May you find forgiveness for yourself and forgive others.
      May you share freely, never taking more than you give.
  

  The Code of Ethics can be thought as its natural extension, not merely a knee-jerk reaction to various Codes of Conduct.

• by tomlockwood on 12/7/23, 6:30 AM

  I think this gets shared occasionally and my suspicion is its as a reaction to the many organisations that have no problem having a code of conduct that calls out bad behaviour that a certain set of readers wish they were still able to get away with. And frankly, if that's the case, posting this is cope.

• by droopyEyelids on 12/7/23, 5:00 AM

  It seems pretty good except for the parts about not getting drunk and not trying to make people laugh

  Actually on second thought, its fine to exclude those from a mission focused collaborative coding space.

  Take jokes and drunkeness to a different medium

• by jj999 on 12/7/23, 5:13 AM

  We live in a very sad world if software projects now have official religion.

• by Mountain_Skies on 12/7/23, 4:23 AM

  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.

• by treadmill on 12/7/23, 6:24 AM

  Ugh. Religion is so cringe.

• by marginalia_nu on 12/7/23, 3:07 AM

  I like it!