Re: Code of Conduct plan - Mailing list pgsql-general

On Fri, Sep 14, 2018 at 7:47 PM Peter Geoghegan <pg@bowt.ie> wrote:

With regard to the  concerns about authoritarianism, I have to defend the Code of Conduct here.

It's not anything of the above.  The PostgreSQL project has a pretty good track record of ensuring that people can participate across boundaries of culture, ethnicity, political ideology (which is always informed by culture and ethnicity), and the like.  On the whole I trust the committee to make sound judgments.

The thing is, yes it is scary that someone might be effectively denied access to commons based on false accusations, but it is also concerning that people might be driven away from commons by aggressive harassment (on or off list) or the like.  The code of conduct is a welcome step in that goal.  I think we should trust long-standing communities with a track record of being generally cultivating access to the commons with decisions which foster that.   The fact is, at least I would hope we all agree that 

This is basic governance.  Communities require arbitration and management of the economic commons we build together and this is a part of that.  I am pretty sure that's why the expansive wording was included.  And I support the right of the committee to act even for off-list behavior when it is appropriate to do so.  That part, I am not questioning.  I think that's important.

So I think a lot of the hysteria misses the point.  We have good people.  We have a generally good track record of getting along.  We have a track record of not being mean to eachother because of differences in political, social, religious, etc. belief.  The committee as a custodian of this community can't really take the hard sides on divisive issues that we might expect in, say, an American corporation like Mozilla or Google.  I think people who worry about this don't get the weight of responsibility that will be placed on such individuals to support a breathtakingly diverse international project and keep the peace, giving people room for civic engagement even on divisive issues.

And frankly I am probably being paranoid here though I find paranoia is a good thing when it comes to care of databases and computer systems.  But I do worry about the interactions between the PostgreSQL community and the larger world with things worded this way.