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Debugging conference anti-harassment policiesDebugging conference anti-harassment policiesPosted Feb 8, 2011 1:22 UTC (Tue) by BrucePerens (guest, #2510)In reply to: Debugging conference anti-harassment policies by sfeam Parent article: Debugging conference anti-harassment policies
Bruce, are you seriously suggesting that the organizers of a conference are violating your civil rights if they do not choose to invite you as a speaker? Or by not choosing to invite a particular speaker you would like to hear? Let's not be silly, please. Were you to speak as much as I have, you would not really want to go to yet another conference and deprive your 10-year-old of his daddy for another week. I make sure Stanley gets lots of my time, and consider conference opportunities very carefully. I turn down opening keynotes more often than not. However, I have seen opportunities where I would have submitted a paper, were the speaker guidelines not in place. But a policy that violates my rights is not acceptable, so I refrain from submitting. I understand the problem the guidelines are meant to address and wish to solve it fairly.
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Debugging conference anti-harassment policies Posted Feb 8, 2011 2:02 UTC (Tue) by sfeam (subscriber, #2841) [Link]
That is a distinction without a difference. If you choose not to submit a talk that you think will be turned down as being contrary to the guidelines for selected presentations, that is a rational choice that saves everyone involved from a hassle. But nowhere in that scenario is there any violation of your civil rights.
Debugging conference anti-harassment policies Posted Feb 8, 2011 2:12 UTC (Tue) by BrucePerens (guest, #2510) [Link] You don't seem to have parsed my reason. I am not refraining from submitting because I believe I would be rejected. I know how to produce speech proposals that are reliably accepted and have keynoted a conference of the organization behind the policy in question.I am refraining from submitting because I would have to be subjected to a policy that violates my rights, and is arbitrary and non-deterministic in the way it does so because of its vagueness and subjective nature - so there is no telling what will "offend" or "make someone uncomfortable" and no way to defend myself. For you to tell me "just don't submit" is like saying "That lady should simply have stayed in the back of the bus".
Debugging conference anti-harassment policies Posted Feb 8, 2011 3:35 UTC (Tue) by mjg59 (subscriber, #23239) [Link]
"You don't seem to have parsed my reason. I am not refraining from submitting because I believe I would be rejected. I know how to produce speech proposals that are reliably accepted and have keynoted a conference of the organization behind the policy in question."
You're confusing the Gnome Speaker Guidelines (which I wrote the first draft of) with the Anti-Harassment Policy adopted by LCA (which I had nothing to with).
"I am refraining from submitting because I would have to be subjected to a policy that violates my rights"
Given that you don't have any right to appear at a conference in the first place, and given that conferences have the right to terminate presentations at any time for any reason and issue whatever apologies they want to, I'm struggling to see how this violates your rights in any way whatsoever.
'For you to tell me "just don't submit" is like saying "That lady should simply have stayed in the back of the bus".'
You're genuinely arguing that a private event's requirement that speakers and attendees be conscious of the effect that their behaviour may have on others is equivalent to state-backed discrimination against its own citizens in their public life on the basis of the colour of their skin? There's... rather a lot of ways in which these things aren't analogous.
Debugging conference anti-harassment policies Posted Feb 8, 2011 4:05 UTC (Tue) by BrucePerens (guest, #2510) [Link] You are correct, I am connecting the AHP with the GSP erroneously - at least if the AHP is not in any way derivative of the GSP. They both seem to embed the same problem of not being rights-based. Given that you don't have any right to appear at a conference in the first place, and given that conferences have the right to terminate presentations at any time for any reason and issue whatever apologies they want to, I'm struggling to see how this violates your rights in any way whatsoever. Suppose the conference decided to handle the problem of bad things happening to women by prohibiting women from attending. By your theory, the women's rights would not be violated. Apply your statement to the women instead of me: "they don't have any rights to attend in the first place". Sounds wrong, doesn't it? The plight of a speaker who values intellectual freedom (within clear limits designed to protect others) may be a lesser plight than the plight of women (or Blacks, in my previous example) but his rights are still worthy of protection.
Debugging conference anti-harassment policies Posted Feb 8, 2011 14:07 UTC (Tue) by mjg59 (subscriber, #23239) [Link]
"Suppose the conference decided to handle the problem of bad things happening to women by prohibiting women from attending. By your theory, the women's rights would not be violated. Apply your statement to the women instead of me: "they don't have any rights to attend in the first place". Sounds wrong, doesn't it?"
If a conference chose to discriminate along those lines, it's not a conference I'd choose to attend. But as a privately-run event, the organisers would be within their rights to discriminate in that manner.
"The plight of a speaker who values intellectual freedom (within clear limits designed to protect others) may be a lesser plight than the plight of women (or Blacks, in my previous example) but his rights are still worthy of protection."
And that speaker has the right to speak at a different conference, or to organise a competing conference with a different set of behavioural policies. But since that speaker never had a right to speak at this conference in the first place, putting boundaries on their behaviour within the context of the conference is not limiting their rights.
Debugging conference anti-harassment policies Posted Feb 8, 2011 4:36 UTC (Tue) by sfeam (subscriber, #2841) [Link] Your position may be more nuanced, but if so you are not explaining it very well. From where I sit, it comes across like a parody:
Organizers: We welcome talks that meet the conference theme and guidelines.
Debugging conference anti-harassment policies Posted Feb 8, 2011 5:03 UTC (Tue) by BrucePerens (guest, #2510) [Link] I do want the conference to accept topics that make people uncomfortable, like "why you should not use mono". I don't feel the conference is doing its job otherwise. I do feel that speakers (doesn't have to be me) have a right to present on that sort of topic and that intellectual freedom is harmed if they can't. I want to be able to present my speech without being judged using rules that I can't parse and can't prepare for. I accept that there should be rules to protect other's civil rights. They just have to be clear.
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