Hello, Am Donnerstag, 25. Juni 2020, 10:18:38 CEST schrieb Marina Latini:
Wasn't that the Board opinion after the last election? There are no fake news! That is the reality and you have lost 2 Board Members because you are staying behind the discrimination of different groups of people in the community. I am very surprised and concerned by what emerged from the thread. I am truly concerned that someone felt the need to comment anonymously: this should never happen in a community that aims to be open and inclusive. I think it is necessary to ask why this has become necessary. As a
On Wed, 24 Jun 2020 at 22:23, Sarah Julia Kriesch wrote: proud community member part of the board, and I think I can speak for the other colleagues on the board as well, I ask everyone to speak freely, and to express directly. Being on the board also means listening to constructive criticisms and educated opinions. Another thing that worries me, and that personally offends me, is that someone may think that the board can implement any form of discrimination; During these years both I and the communities with which I have had the pleasure and the honor of collaborating, we have committed ourselves to actively fight any form of discrimination of any kind. For the sake of this community, I invite anyone with reasons to feel discriminated against to come forward without fear and to share their experience with us.
From all I know, that could indeed be the case, but that wouldn't make
That statement sounds good, but hearing it from you or the current board [0] is more than strange. The last person who felt discriminated and asked the board for support was shouted down and kicked out (including being shouted down and getting all arguments rejected when trying to explain why she felt discriminated), and the main reason quoted for kicking her out was based on a sidenote in that request for support. And now you write the above without feeling bad? Seriously? I hate to say that, but with the current board, I can't recommend to ask the board for support in such cases. Maybe the problem is limited to a specific "whitelisted" [1] person on the "other side"? things better. Quite the opposite.
I want to express maximum openness in this regard.
As you wish - I hope the above was open enough ;-) (while still not completely open to protect the involved) If not, I can offer more things, but given that they involve human beings and anonymization is very hard (fully anonym = no longer understandable), it's probably better for all involved people not to bring these things up in public.
At the same time, however, I am urged to suggest not to use the term "discrimination" for things that have nothing to do with it. This is a serious problem, and using this term improperly risks undermining the work of all those who are committed to actively fighting it.
To start with - can we please first have an as-exact-as-possible definition/description of what is or isn't discrimination? I'll start with https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discrimination because that matches my understanding: Discrimination is the act of making distinctions between human beings based on the groups, classes, or other categories to which they are perceived to belong. People may discriminate on the basis of age, caste, [... long list ...] as well as other categories. There can be positive (not punishing someone who misbehaved) and negative discrimination (for example punishing someone who did nothing wrong) - since we are a mostly technical community, they are easily explained by the words "whitelisting" and "blocklisting" ([1] again). Can we agree on this definition? As a somewhat obscure (and admittedly not-too-serious) example: I like wine and don't like beer. And at many conferences I get discriminated for my drinking habits at the openSUSE booth because we only offer beer ;-) [2] While this is only a minor thing, IMHO it still technically qualifies as discrimination (I get discriminated for my wine preference) - and also shows that there are different levels of discrimination, starting from minor annoyances (no wine at the booth) up to serious issues. (Needless to say that I won't file a formal complaint because "no wine" is too minor compared to "serious" discrimination.) The things that end up with the board are much more serious, but are still far from the highest level - sadly some recent events in the USA redefined what worst-case discrimination can be. Regards, Christian Boltz [0] Vinz joined the board late enough to count as an exception [1] I know that the word "whitelisting" can be seen as discriminating (because of "white"), but so far I haven't heard an alternative that is better and still understandable for everybody. On the positive side, it's easy to replace "blacklist" with "blocklist" - and while I've seen people using "allowlist" instead of "whitelist", that (still?) sounds somewhat strange to me. [2] Just to make it clear: the outcome of that not-so-serious example should _not_ be that we don't offer beer anymore - it's a good way to get people to our booth. However, I won't complain if we also offer wine or other drinks - and I'm sure that would bring even more people to our booth. Post-Covid19 of course, virtual wine just isn't the same as real wine. -- * cboltz votes for the boring version - can't <sarnold> that's a bit informal for a mandatory security platform :) <sbeattie> ah, but you see, contractions are informal, and we can't, err can not, err cannot, err can ?not have that. [from #apparmor, while discussing bugzilla.novell.com/853661] -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org To contact the owner, email: opensuse-project+owner@opensuse.org