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Re: Debian supports pridemonth?

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  Re: Debian supports pridemonth? Gerardo Ballabio <gerardo.ballabio@gmail.com> - 2019-07-01 09:00 +0200
    Re: Debian supports pridemonth? Andreas Tille <andreas@an3as.eu> - 2019-07-01 09:40 +0200
    Re: Debian supports pridemonth? Alex Mestiashvili <amestia@rsh2.donotuse.de> - 2019-07-01 10:40 +0200
    Re: Debian supports pridemonth? Norbert Preining <norbert@preining.info> - 2019-07-01 11:10 +0200
      Speaking your Mind Sam Hartman <leader@debian.org> - 2019-07-01 20:10 +0200
        Re: Speaking your Mind Holger Levsen <holger@layer-acht.org> - 2019-07-02 16:50 +0200
          Re: Speaking your Mind Holger Levsen <holger@layer-acht.org> - 2019-07-02 16:50 +0200
          Re: Speaking your Mind Sam Hartman <hartmans@debian.org> - 2019-07-02 18:10 +0200
          Re: Speaking your Mind Russ Allbery <rra@debian.org> - 2019-07-02 18:30 +0200
            Re: Speaking your Mind Holger Levsen <holger@layer-acht.org> - 2019-07-19 23:30 +0200
    Re: Debian supports pridemonth? Russ Allbery <rra@debian.org> - 2019-07-01 18:30 +0200
      Re: Debian supports pridemonth? Karsten Merker <merker@debian.org> - 2019-07-01 22:30 +0200
        Re: Debian supports pridemonth? Marc Haber <mh+debian-project@zugschlus.de> - 2019-07-02 11:40 +0200
      Re: Debian supports pridemonth? Eldon Koyle <ekoyle@gmail.com> - 2019-07-02 00:40 +0200
        Re: Debian supports pridemonth? Russ Allbery <rra@debian.org> - 2019-07-02 01:10 +0200
      Re: Debian supports pridemonth? Gerardo Ballabio <gerardo.ballabio@gmail.com> - 2019-07-02 15:20 +0200
        Re: Debian supports pridemonth? Ondřej Surý <ondrej@sury.org> - 2019-07-02 15:50 +0200

#10623 — Re: Debian supports pridemonth?

(Sorry to break the thread, but I wasn't Cc:d this message)

Russ Allbery wrote:
> So, we should look to our LGBTQ project members to decide what Debian should do for Pride, to our Hispanic members to decide what Debian should do for Hispanic Heritage Month, and so forth, since they're the experts on what they would find the most meaningful within the Debian context.

A devil's advocate question/intentionally extreme example: if there
were any Nazi project members, should we leave up to them to announce
how Debian supports Nazi Month? By putting a swastika-shaped swirl on
the Debian home page?

Clearly, there must be a prior assessment that any particular group's
values are aligned with Debian's values. And I don't think that this
is, or should be, within the bounds of the Publicity Team delegation.

Now, in this particular case, I'd agree that the assessment was made
in the discussion that led to the Diversity Statement being approved.
But it seems to me that the Diversity Statement was intentionally
worded in a "least common denominator" way -- Debian welcomes minority
people, but doesn't necessarily support the initiatives of a
particular minority group.

An example that is probably more to the point: Debian certainly
welcomes Israeli people, but if publicity were to issue a statement
that Debian supports a Zionist initiative, I'm sure that many would
object. (There is of course a difference between being Israeli and
being a Zionist. I'd argue that it is the exact same difference that
there is between being LGBTQ+ and being an LGBTQ+ activist.)

On the other hand, nobody but me has spoken openly to say that it was
a mistake to issue that statement. So I'm taking that as meaning that
there is indeed a project-wide consensus that it was ok.

Thank you all for your contributions to this discussion.
Gerardo

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#10624

On Mon, Jul 01, 2019 at 08:37:13AM +0200, Gerardo Ballabio wrote:
> 
> On the other hand, nobody but me has spoken openly to say that it was
> a mistake to issue that statement. So I'm taking that as meaning that
> there is indeed a project-wide consensus that it was ok.

I do not consider it a mistake but I was astonished about changing the
logo.  While I *personally* think it is definitely a good thing that we
are inclusive it flashed through my mind that Free Software is not
political (see the non-free licenses like "GPL but you are not permitted
to do evil" or so).  And yes, I've read Russ' good arguments to be
political.

I simply refrained from contributing to that discussion (and will not
take part any more) since I consider discussing this topic on the
mailing list as very less productive.  Lets do this at DebConf rather
face to face.

Kind regards

        Andreas.

-- 
http://fam-tille.de

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#10625

> On the other hand, nobody but me has spoken openly to say that it was
> a mistake to issue that statement. So I'm taking that as meaning that
> there is indeed a project-wide consensus that it was ok.
> 
> Thank you all for your contributions to this discussion.
> Gerardo
> 

Hi Gerardo,

I was actually about to write a mail to the initial topic, but then I
though that I better ignore it, as additional attention is exactly what
the "minorities" are looking for.

So, here is my +1. I found it very wrong what publicity team did. And in
my humble opinion they take way too much responsibility for no visible
benefit for Debian.

First Daniel/Norbert issue, now this, it all leaves very unpleasant
feeling. This is the last mail from me about this topic.

Best,
Alex

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#10626

Hi Gerardo,

> On the other hand, nobody but me has spoken openly to say that it was
> a mistake to issue that statement. So I'm taking that as meaning that
> there is indeed a project-wide consensus that it was ok.

I am currently in a dangerous position to utter anything that is not in
line with the current main way of thinking.

But rest assured, there are enough who agree with you.

Norbert

--
PREINING Norbert                               http://www.preining.info
Accelia Inc. + IFMGA ProGuide + TU Wien + JAIST + TeX Live + Debian Dev
GPG: 0x860CDC13   fp: F7D8 A928 26E3 16A1 9FA0 ACF0 6CAC A448 860C DC13

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#10631 — Speaking your Mind

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>>>>> "Norbert" == Norbert Preining <norbert@preining.info> writes:

    Norbert> Hi Gerardo,
    >> On the other hand, nobody but me has spoken openly to say that it
    >> was a mistake to issue that statement. So I'm taking that as
    >> meaning that there is indeed a project-wide consensus that it was
    >> ok.

    Norbert> I am currently in a dangerous position to utter anything
    Norbert> that is not in line with the current main way of thinking.

Hi.  I'm going to reply to Norbert privately with advice specific to his
situation, but I've heard a number of people recently say they are
uncomfortable speaking their mind because they're concerned about
repercussions presumably from antiharassment, account managers, DPL, or
list masters or similar.

Russ talked about the inherent censorship we exercise as adults.  I
absolutely hope that we do watch what we say because we care about each
other and we want to make sure we are well understood and do not hurt
each other needlessly.  I absolutely do hope we double check potentially
touchy emails.  I absolutely do hope that when we need it we ask others
to read over what we send.

But I don't want there to be a chilling effect out of fear.  And I
certainly don't want there to be a chilling effect caused by lack of
understanding in how AH/DAM/DPL/listmaster work.  I'm going to give some
advice here, but please, if you are afraid to speak your mind, reach out
on list, in mail to me, or in mail to antiharassment and let's chat.
Our goal is to create a community that works together not a community of
fear.

In almost all the cases I'm aware of, problems come up based on how
someone reacts when a member of our community wants to engage with them
about their behavior.  That's right, the problem is almost always how
people are reacting to criticism, not their ideas or ideology.


The Antiharassment team, account manager and I want to create a
community where when someone approaches you with a problem, you're
expected to engage with them constructively.  When that happens, it is
unlikely that action will be taken, and exceedingly unlikely that action
will be taken quickly.

Example of what we hope happens:

* I say something

* Someone says that they think I was disrespectful or hurt someone or
  similar.

* I work to try and understand the concern and what the person bringing
  up the concern  hopes I'll do differently.  I create an interaction
  where they feel comfortable bringing up concerns with me in the future
  *especially* when I don't resolve the concern the way they were hoping
  I would.

* I work to disagree with ideas not people.  Especially if I'm coming
  across as judging someone for who they are or what they believe, I
  make my position more clear.

* Sometimes we're going to hurt each other.  Example: as DPL, when I
  contemplate changing delegations or team membership in order to
  improve a team, it's very likely that if people affected don't agree
  with my decision they are going to be very hurt.  Treating them with
  respect in that situation can involve acknowledging the hurt, and
  trying very hard not to judge them as people.  Demonstrating that you
  care when the things you say are painful goes a really long way.


* Being responsive and keeping the discussion going matters a lot.  I
acknowledge that those of us working on conduct issues have significant
improvement to make in this regard.

But again the biggest number one thing you can do is to create a
constructive interaction where people are comfortable coming to you with
problems.  If you do that and keep the communication open, you're very
unlikely to be surprised by your interactions with Antiharassment, me or
the account managers.

Examples of Things that are Problematic:

* When your response to a concern is to immediately deny that there's an
  issue.  Sometimes you'll disagree, but please take the time to
  understand first.

* Focusing on legalisms--did you technically violate some rule or
  not--rather than expressing empathy for what's going on.  If someone
  is hurt when they read your mails or interact with you, please take
  the time to actually think about whether you can accomplish your goals
  without causing as much pain.  If there are simple changes you can
  make that work for you and make things work better for them, does it
  actually matter whether you've violated the letter of some rule?

* Attack the people bringing concerns or use a tone where they feel
  uncomfortable talking to you about issues they have.

* Counter attacking/bringing up someone else's behavior without also
  working on the concern.  "I'm not going to change until this other
  issue changes."

* Be respectful especially in disagreement.

Over and over again when talking to members of DAM, the message I've
gotten for them is that the trigger for considering whether there is a
membership issue is when someone is failing to constructively interact
with the community.  When they bully--when they respond so strongly and
negatively that they make it hard to discuss things with them.  When
multiple people have a hard time conversing about concerns.  When they
disappear from important conversations.

Yes, there are times when actually saying something or expressing an
idea in Debian contexts is inappropriate.  We saw such an issue the
other day where someone thought they might have crossed a line.  It
wasn't a big deal: I said that I agreed that really didn't seem to be an
appropriate discussion for the list and we were done.  I actually did
get some private mail asking why I thought asking about someone's
politics in that area was inappropriate.  It was respectful; I answered.
I think I came across as more conservative than the person was hoping I
would.  But because we interacted constructively I think it worked well
on all sides.

Similarly, we've had some challenges around Debconf 20.  Taking a stance
against the citizens of Israel simply is not appropriate in a Debian
forum.  In general, Middle East politics is not actually on topic for
debconf lists.  And yet that particular decision has brought some things
into scope (in the right context) that otherwise would not be in scope.
I've tried to outline my position on that in
https://lists.debian.org/msgid-search/tslef52guz7.fsf@suchdamage.org

Discussing whether the publicity team made a reasonable decision in this
instance is certainly in scope for debian-project.
Clearly homophobia would be inappropriate in this discussion as in any
Debian context.  If someone crossed that line, I'd hope members of our
community, whether they were from the Antiharassment team or not, would
raise the issue in a respectful manner.  And if we reached understanding
and agreement to follow our standards we'd be done with the issue.

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#10669 — Re: Speaking your Mind

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On Mon, Jul 01, 2019 at 02:07:37PM -0400, Sam Hartman wrote:
> But I don't want there to be a chilling effect out of fear.  

yet today you asked this discussion to be stopped, even though the
thread was civil and on-topic.



and btw, just about celebrating hispanic heritage... the Spanish were
responsible (with a bunch of other European countries) for destroying
several cultures in the Americas (and elsewhere), slaughtering people
and what not and you want to celebrate this? (Same for most other
European cultures...)

And, for the love of baby jesus^wdevil, please dont even think about
celebrating religions.

IOW: i'd rather we celebrate technology (mostly and foremost).


-- 
tschau,
	Holger, who is happy we changed the Debian logo for this month
	while at the same time seeing how close this is to opening a can
	of worms.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
               holger@(debian|reproducible-builds|layer-acht).org
       PGP fingerprint: B8BF 5413 7B09 D35C F026 FE9D 091A B856 069A AA1C

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#10670 — Re: Speaking your Mind

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On Tue, Jul 02, 2019 at 02:44:33PM +0000, Holger Levsen wrote:
> and btw, just about celebrating hispanic heritage... the Spanish were
> responsible (with a bunch of other European countries) for destroying
> several cultures in the Americas (and elsewhere), slaughtering people
> and what not and you want to celebrate this? (Same for most other
> European cultures...)
> 
> And, for the love of baby jesus^wdevil, please dont even think about
> celebrating religions.
> 
> IOW: i'd rather we celebrate technology (mostly and foremost).

for the avoidance of the doubt: these paragraphs were not at all
directed at Sam. I just wanted to send a quick single mail to this
thread, and should have spent a bit more time on this. Sorry for that.

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#10673 — Re: Speaking your Mind

>>>>> "Holger" == Holger Levsen <holger@layer-acht.org> writes:

    Holger> On Mon, Jul 01, 2019 at 02:07:37PM -0400, Sam Hartman wrote:
    >> But I don't want there to be a chilling effect out of fear.

    Holger> yet today you asked this discussion to be stopped, even
    Holger> though the thread was civil and on-topic.

I believe the discussion has drifted to a point where it is off topic.
I explained why.
It's my opinion that basic education about diversity and inclusion is
off-topic fnor debian-project and that the discussion had diverged into
this point.

You can disagree with me, and apparently listmaster do, but we stop
off-topic discussions all the time.

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#10674 — Re: Speaking your Mind

I think this thread has mostly run its course, but there's a point in here
that's extremely important to me that I can't leave unsaid.

Holger Levsen <holger@layer-acht.org> writes:

> and btw, just about celebrating hispanic heritage... the Spanish were
> responsible (with a bunch of other European countries) for destroying
> several cultures in the Americas (and elsewhere), slaughtering people
> and what not and you want to celebrate this? (Same for most other
> European cultures...)

> And, for the love of baby jesus^wdevil, please dont even think about
> celebrating religions.

The intent of recognizing the Hispanic heritage of project members, if
that's meaningful to them, is not to sanction everything Hispanic or
Spanish people have done in history.  The intent of recognizing a
religious day of significance to some project members is not to endorse or
celebrate the religion.  It's to celebrate and support the *people* in the
project for whom this matters.

I want it to be possible to simultaneously be troubled by or even outright
disagree with something that is significant to someone else, and also
celebrate with them the positive and affirming aspects of what that thing
means *to them*, and how it enriches their lives.

To be clear, this should be strictly optional.  If someone has
particularly strong feelings, they should be able to opt out of
participating in that celebration with no questions asked and no offense
taken.  (And yes, I realize that's what makes a temporary logo change
tricky, because while I don't think of it this way, I can see how people
may feel like this is forcing them to participate in a way.)  But it's
still important to me to make a space for this in communities, because
people's celebrations are part of their identity and part of who they are,
in much the same way that writing long emails to mailing lists is part of
my identity and part of who I am, and I'd get very grumpy if I had to
suppress that.  :)

For example (chosen because I think it may be less common to some readers
and therefore a bit less loaded; apologies in advance if I botch something
I'm not personally that familiar with), I'm personally an atheist.  For
various reasons, I have extremely strong feelings about religion and its
role in history, and they're not very positive ones.  I also have some
strong feelings about some aspects of the cross-section of religion and
politics in India at the moment.  But I still want to make space for
project members to celebrate Diwali in a way that's meaningful to them,
and support that, and I want to support that in areas of shared
universality: food, beautiful displays of light, and so forth.  It doesn't
mean that I agree with everything they may believe.  It means that I see
the human being in my fellow member of the project, I see that person as
an individual with cultural and religious traditions that are important
*to them* even if they aren't to me, and I want them to feel welcome and
seen as their whole selves.

This can be a tricky balancing act, to be sure.  Religion, politics,
humor, offense, discrimination, identity, bigotry, history, and oppression
are all tangled together and incredibly complex and fraught.  But, to me,
asking people to leave their moments of celebration outside of the project
and to limit their project presence to purely technical contributions is
essentially to ask them to cut off all of the parts of themselves that do
not fit into the stereotypical norm of a Debian project contributor.  And
that stereotypical norm is not politically neutral.  It looks a lot like
the base beliefs of a white man from Europe, the United States, Australia,
or Canada.

I have lost track of who said this, but some wise person once said that
one's politics are defined by what you don't think should be political.
The things I find perfectly normal and ordinary and that I am astonished
that anyone would disagree with are, in some foundational way, my core
political beliefs.  By asking people to confine themselves to that set of
behavior, I'm not being politically neutral, even though it feels like
that to me.

-- 
Russ Allbery (rra@debian.org)               <http://www.eyrie.org/~eagle/>

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#10763 — Re: Speaking your Mind

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On Tue, Jul 02, 2019 at 09:21:47AM -0700, Russ Allbery wrote:
> I think this thread has mostly run its course, but there's a point in here
> that's extremely important to me that I can't leave unsaid.

same here. 

> Holger Levsen <holger@layer-acht.org> writes:
> 
> > and btw, just about celebrating hispanic heritage... the Spanish were
> > responsible (with a bunch of other European countries) for destroying
> > several cultures in the Americas (and elsewhere), slaughtering people
> > and what not and you want to celebrate this? (Same for most other
> > European cultures...)
> 
> > And, for the love of baby jesus^wdevil, please dont even think about
> > celebrating religions.
> 
> The intent of recognizing the Hispanic heritage of project members, if
> that's meaningful to them, is not to sanction everything Hispanic or
> Spanish people have done in history.  The intent of recognizing a
> religious day of significance to some project members is not to endorse or
> celebrate the religion.  It's to celebrate and support the *people* in the
> project for whom this matters.

I think it's basically impossible to seperate this. Maybe you can, maybe
I can, but I'm sure this is not how it will be seen by everyone. eg I
dont think 'celebrating the USA' would be seen as celebrating the people
who are happy to live there, but rather (also) as celebrating the
current guy in the white house.

> I want it to be possible to simultaneously be troubled by or even outright
> disagree with something that is significant to someone else, and also
> celebrate with them the positive and affirming aspects of what that thing
> means *to them*, and how it enriches their lives.

I want to be in a place where I can smoke and others can enjoy their
right of smoke-free air but thats just not possible.

 
> For example (chosen because I think it may be less common to some readers
> and therefore a bit less loaded; apologies in advance if I botch something
> I'm not personally that familiar with), I'm personally an atheist.  For
> various reasons, I have extremely strong feelings about religion and its
> role in history, and they're not very positive ones.  I also have some
> strong feelings about some aspects of the cross-section of religion and
> politics in India at the moment.  But I still want to make space for
> project members to celebrate Diwali in a way that's meaningful to them,
> and support that, and I want to support that in areas of shared
> universality: food, beautiful displays of light, and so forth.  It doesn't
> mean that I agree with everything they may believe.  It means that I see
> the human being in my fellow member of the project, I see that person as
> an individual with cultural and religious traditions that are important
> *to them* even if they aren't to me, and I want them to feel welcome and
> seen as their whole selves.

so you would also be happy if the project would celebrate christmas,
christianity or satanism? I wouldnt.

> This can be a tricky balancing act, to be sure.  Religion, politics,
> humor, offense, discrimination, identity, bigotry, history, and oppression
> are all tangled together and incredibly complex and fraught.  But, to me,
> asking people to leave their moments of celebration outside of the project
> and to limit their project presence to purely technical contributions is
> essentially to ask them to cut off all of the parts of themselves that do
> not fit into the stereotypical norm of a Debian project contributor.  And
> that stereotypical norm is not politically neutral.  It looks a lot like
> the base beliefs of a white man from Europe, the United States, Australia,
> or Canada.

while I see your point here for the reasons I tried to explain above I
don't think we as a project can do this balancing.

For diversity, we voted on https://www.debian.org/vote/2012/vote_002 so
I think we agreed on this. And then this immediatly very tricky as this
vote can also be read as welcoming christians, satanists, racists etc as
long as they work constructivly in our commutity :/

> I have lost track of who said this, but some wise person once said that
> one's politics are defined by what you don't think should be political.
> The things I find perfectly normal and ordinary and that I am astonished
> that anyone would disagree with are, in some foundational way, my core
> political beliefs.  By asking people to confine themselves to that set of
> behavior, I'm not being politically neutral, even though it feels like
> that to me.

agreed.

(I guess we can now just agree to disagree.)


-- 
tschau,
	Holger

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
               holger@(debian|reproducible-builds|layer-acht).org
       PGP fingerprint: B8BF 5413 7B09 D35C F026 FE9D 091A B856 069A AA1C

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#10627

Gerardo Ballabio <gerardo.ballabio@gmail.com> writes:

> Clearly, there must be a prior assessment that any particular group's
> values are aligned with Debian's values.

Sure, of course.

> And I don't think that this is, or should be, within the bounds of the
> Publicity Team delegation.

I think this is probably the place where we disagree.

That said, how *do* you want to handle this, assuming that other people in
the project do want to acknowledge important events for our community
members?  For example, Debian has made note of Diwali in the past in
various ways (arguably less obviously than changing the logo, to be fair),
and it's been entirely uncontroversial.

Having a GR every time the project wants to acknowledge a day that is
important to part of the project seems rather excessive to me.

Perhaps it's just because I come from a work culture where this sort of
acknowledgement is entirely routine and unexceptional, but this all feels
like a tempest in a teapot to me.  My position is that if some subgroup of
Debian wants some sort of acknowledgement that's meaningful to them, we
should default to doing so unless we have some obvious reason not to, and
I trust the Publicity Team to judge whether such a reason exists and
escalate or figure out some other approach if it does.

I think this is much less complicated than people are making it.

Now, if the *actual* issue here isn't about process, but is instead an
argument that Debian shouldn't be recognizing Pride, specifically, then we
simply disagree, and I'm not sure fiddling with the process is going to
help.  And no, I don't think this is something the project should avoid
because it makes some people uncomfortable.  If we have to hold a GR on
having Debian acknowledge Pride, I'll second it, and I suspect it will
pass easily; I just hope we can avoid that.

> An example that is probably more to the point: Debian certainly
> welcomes Israeli people, but if publicity were to issue a statement
> that Debian supports a Zionist initiative, I'm sure that many would
> object.

We could instead acknowledging Jewish holidays as a way of making our
Jewish community in general feel welcome (if that is something that would
be meaningful to them).  For instance, Jewish co-workers at my job
organize an after-work Passover meal each year and invite anyone who wants
to join.

Corporations navigate this routinely, despite much stronger constraints
(even legal constraints) on what types of acknowledgements they can do.

> (There is of course a difference between being Israeli and being a
> Zionist. I'd argue that it is the exact same difference that there is
> between being LGBTQ+ and being an LGBTQ+ activist.)

Pride is not the activist event that it used to be, at least in the United
States and I believe in a lot of Europe.  It's become very mainstream.
(This is something that some people in the LGBTQ+ community are also
rather frustrated with, as it turns out, but nonetheless, I think that's
where we are today.)

-- 
Russ Allbery (rra@debian.org)               <http://www.eyrie.org/~eagle/>

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#10636

On Mon, Jul 01, 2019 at 09:24:34AM -0700, Russ Allbery wrote:
> Gerardo Ballabio <gerardo.ballabio@gmail.com> writes:
[...]
> > And I don't think that this is, or should be, within the bounds of the
> > Publicity Team delegation.
> 
> I think this is probably the place where we disagree.
> 
> That said, how *do* you want to handle this, assuming that other people in
> the project do want to acknowledge important events for our community
> members?  For example, Debian has made note of Diwali in the past in
> various ways (arguably less obviously than changing the logo, to be fair),
> and it's been entirely uncontroversial.
[...]
> Perhaps it's just because I come from a work culture where this sort of
> acknowledgement is entirely routine and unexceptional, but this all feels
> like a tempest in a teapot to me.

The latter is probably a cultural issue that varies significantly
depending on where one lives and works.  My personal experience
with the various places that I have worked at has been exactly
the opposite from yours - employers have strictly avoided any
form of communication towards their employees that could be even
remotely related to religion or politics and employees were
expected to not issue any statements with religious or political
connotations when they spoke on behalf of the company.

Regards,
Karsten
-- 
Ich widerspreche hiermit ausdrücklich der Nutzung sowie der
Weitergabe meiner personenbezogenen Daten für Zwecke der Werbung
sowie der Markt- oder Meinungsforschung.

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#10652

On Mon, Jul 01, 2019 at 10:24:33PM +0200, Karsten Merker wrote:
> On Mon, Jul 01, 2019 at 09:24:34AM -0700, Russ Allbery wrote:
> > Gerardo Ballabio <gerardo.ballabio@gmail.com> writes:
> [...]
> > > And I don't think that this is, or should be, within the bounds of the
> > > Publicity Team delegation.
> > 
> > I think this is probably the place where we disagree.
> > 
> > That said, how *do* you want to handle this, assuming that other people in
> > the project do want to acknowledge important events for our community
> > members?  For example, Debian has made note of Diwali in the past in
> > various ways (arguably less obviously than changing the logo, to be fair),
> > and it's been entirely uncontroversial.
> [...]
> > Perhaps it's just because I come from a work culture where this sort of
> > acknowledgement is entirely routine and unexceptional, but this all feels
> > like a tempest in a teapot to me.
> 
> The latter is probably a cultural issue that varies significantly
> depending on where one lives and works.  My personal experience
> with the various places that I have worked at has been exactly
> the opposite from yours - employers have strictly avoided any
> form of communication towards their employees that could be even
> remotely related to religion or politics and employees were
> expected to not issue any statements with religious or political
> connotations when they spoke on behalf of the company.

Fully agreed. I don't think of any German company that would change its
LOGO (for crying out loud!) to care for a minority or even the majority
of its employees.

I once worked at a company where they rolled out a green carpet with
white lines in the entrance hall (thereby covering their logo that was
woven in the regular carpet) and put up a soccer goal during the world
championship. I don't care about the multi-million euro business that
masquerades itself as "sports", and I hated it.

Greetings
Marc


-- 
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Marc Haber         | "I don't trust Computers. They | Mailadresse im Header
Leimen, Germany    |  lose things."    Winona Ryder | Fon: *49 6224 1600402
Nordisch by Nature |  How to make an American Quilt | Fax: *49 6224 1600421

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#10639

On Mon, Jul 1, 2019 at 10:24 AM Russ Allbery <rra@debian.org> wrote:
>
> Gerardo Ballabio <gerardo.ballabio@gmail.com> writes:
>
> > Clearly, there must be a prior assessment that any particular group's
> > values are aligned with Debian's values.
>
> Sure, of course.
>
> > And I don't think that this is, or should be, within the bounds of the
> > Publicity Team delegation.
>
> I think this is probably the place where we disagree.
>
> That said, how *do* you want to handle this, assuming that other people in
> the project do want to acknowledge important events for our community
> members?  For example, Debian has made note of Diwali in the past in
> various ways (arguably less obviously than changing the logo, to be fair),
> and it's been entirely uncontroversial.
<snip>

I think a big part of the issue here is the fact that by changing the
logo for only one group ever (presumably for one month out of every
year?), all other groups are marginalized.

Would the Debian community be willing to change the debian.org logo
for any group who a.) submits a suitable image file and b.) is aligned
with the Debian diversity statement?  If not, then what are the other
conditions, and who makes these decisions on behalf of the community?
How do we ensure that Debian remains unbiased outside the realm of
free software?  (As an aside, I think having the pridemonth logo on
the diversity statement page[1] sends the wrong message for this same
reason.)

How would the community respond if the logo were changed in support of
a fictitious "Male White Anglo-Saxon Protestant Celebration Week", for
example?  According to the diversity statement, Debian welcomes
individuals who fit in that group just as much as any other, and that
group is strongly represented among Debian contributors.

One other reason for some level of controversy is the lack of
precedent (at least that I could find).

[1] https://www.debian.org/intro/diversity

-- 
Eldon Koyle

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#10640

Eldon Koyle <ekoyle@gmail.com> writes:

> I think a big part of the issue here is the fact that by changing the
> logo for only one group ever (presumably for one month out of every
> year?), all other groups are marginalized.

Huh, why?

Organizations to which I belong celebrate all sorts of groups all the time
that I am not a part of, and I have never felt marginalized by that, so I
truly don't understand why this would make you feel that way.

Could it be that this is just the first group for which someone thought of
the idea, did the work, and made it happen?

Personally, I would be delighted if Debian did something like Google did
and changed our logo frequently to celebrate the enormous diversity of our
project, although I'm sure we don't have the resources to pull that off.
But even if we did that, I personally am not a part of any group that I
can think of off-hand that we would celebrate, and not only does that not
bother me, I don't even understand the process by which it would ever
bother me.

Celebrating someone doesn't mean marginalizing someone else.  Being part
of a community isn't an exercise in scale-balancing parsimony.

> How do we ensure that Debian remains unbiased outside the realm of free
> software?

We don't.  It's not possible.  Debian is a collection of humans and humans
have thoughts and political beliefs and are messy and social and
collabortive and spontaneous.  Some things will get time and attention and
resources and other things won't, and that's just what working with a
large collection of other people is like.

What we can strive for, rather than unbiased, is to be positively
inclusive, which means that if something matters to you and you're willing
to do the work and it's a statement of positive inclusion rather than
veiled exclusion (that bit is important; human communications come with
context that matters), let's figure out how to make it happen.

-- 
Russ Allbery (rra@debian.org)               <http://www.eyrie.org/~eagle/>

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#10663

Il giorno lun 1 lug 2019 alle ore 18:24 Russ Allbery <rra@debian.org>
ha scritto:
> That said, how *do* you want to handle this, assuming that other people in
> the project do want to acknowledge important events for our community
> members?  For example, Debian has made note of Diwali in the past in
> various ways (arguably less obviously than changing the logo, to be fair),
> and it's been entirely uncontroversial.
>
> Having a GR every time the project wants to acknowledge a day that is
> important to part of the project seems rather excessive to me.

Hello Russ,
please rest assured that I never thought of a GR.

In fact, I agree that the Publicity Team should normally be trusted to
do the right thing. I just believe that in this case they didn't and
pointed that out. No big deal, we are all humans, mistakes happen.

> Now, if the *actual* issue here isn't about process, but is instead an
> argument that Debian shouldn't be recognizing Pride, specifically, then we
> simply disagree

Yes, that was my concern, and yes, we simply disagree. I hope we can
still be friends :-)

> And no, I don't think this is something the project should avoid
> because it makes some people uncomfortable.

Well, I think that describing the issue as "making some people
uncomfortable" is somewhat downplaying it. As I see it, the issue is
that Debian declared support of a political initiative that project
members have never agreed to support. (I do not think that having
agreed to the Diversity Statement counts as having agreed to support
Pride. See below.) That isn't just "uncomfortable". That's wrong.

> > An example that is probably more to the point: Debian certainly
> > welcomes Israeli people, but if publicity were to issue a statement
> > that Debian supports a Zionist initiative, I'm sure that many would
> > object.
>
> We could instead acknowledging Jewish holidays as a way of making our
> Jewish community in general feel welcome (if that is something that would
> be meaningful to them).  For instance, Jewish co-workers at my job
> organize an after-work Passover meal each year and invite anyone who wants
> to join.

I believe you missed the point of my example. I was trying to say
exactly that making a community feel welcome (what your answer is
aiming to) is not the same thing as supporting the political
initiatives of (some members of) that community, and one may well want
to do the former but not the latter.

Gerardo

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#10666

> On 2 Jul 2019, at 14:53, Gerardo Ballabio <gerardo.ballabio@gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> In fact, I agree that the Publicity Team should normally be trusted to
> do the right thing.

Can we just settle on this and move on with our lives?

Ondrej
--
Ondřej Surý
ondrej@sury.org

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