alt Hacker News> I think that the goal of any code of conduct is to prevent any semblance of arbitrary and whimsical punishment, which can kill entire communities.
Quite ironic then that CoCs overwhelmingly lead to arbitrary and whimsical punishment.
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> Quite ironic then that CoCs overwhelmingly lead to arbitrary and whimsical punishment.
I don't agree. I think it has been working quite well in spite of the conspiratorial bullshit excuses made up by those who failed so hard to human to the point they were slapped with one.
Nevertheless, one of the values of a code of conduct is that people like you and me can check the deliberation and hear what all interested parties had to say. Without a code of conduct, the one with the loudest voice and the more interest to subvert code of conduct deliberations could basically dedicate their life shit-talking the project.
To me this seems to be true. From what I’ve seen CoCs are overwhelmingly used as a tool to enforce and reinforce a certain kind of ideological point of view.
As a result of this typically CoCs are used to block contributions or block contributors from projects where the people enforcing the CoC they wrote wield it as a weapon against men whose perceived personal politics they disagree with. And typically rumours are enough to trigger CoC proceedings against them.