I find that when you start with somebody else’s too-long thing and try to whittle it down, the results aren’t as good as when you start with null and add. The latter approach forces you to actually specify what you need, while the former leads to a lot of “yeah ok, nothing wrong with that” except that the aggregate isn’t so great.
The intent behind most codes of conduct boils down to “don’t be a jerk”. I’d actually be quite pleased if that were our entire code of conduct – four words that establish our goal of civil interaction. But maybe we can’t get away with that and need a few more words, which is why I wrote some of what ended up in Art’s version. (Mine was shorter. )
Codes that are matters of literal life and death need to be more specific. No argument there. I just don’t think we’re in that situation. The closest an online community comes is if somebody is being bullied and harassed to the point of self-harm – and I hope we would step in way before that point, and “don’t be a jerk” would be ample support for doing so already.
Agreed. Spam is already common-sense banned, and useful or community-relevant self-promotion should be ok. On SE that’s in the help, not the code of conduct. (I actually wrote/edited that help topic, using some bits that others had previously written.) I think of a code of conduct as more of a “user contract”, and help as the broader collection of stuff you should know. To me this feels like help, not CoC.
I fear that may be merely more (potentially self-righteous) Humpty-Dumpty stuff, whose interpretation is specific to the sub-culture.
How well would that have worked to arbitrate your dialog with Ms. Chipps – would that have kept you both on the same page, if you were both assuming that was the total of the other’s rule of engagement?
And Americans even don’t all agree with each other in general, for example the left’s “political correctness” is what some others still call “cultural marxism”.
And most of the users on my site aren’t Anglophone, “jerk” is slang and inflammatory, if it’s the only word in the CoC you’re making it carry a lot of weight – you think it’s a word for all occasions but as I said I’d prefer to see the expectations for different occasions (like, “when receiving feedback”) considered and spelled out a bit.
The words in the Convenant are still subject to interpretation (kind, graceful, respectful), I don’t think they unduly limit a moderator’s ability to handle rules-lawyers – probably the opposite, I would guess.
So I’m not convinced by your argument.
The one argument I’ve seen that I find relevant is this …
… i.e. that it’s rejected by community consensus.
I think that that “relies on more moderator judgement to enforce them” than it would if they were more explicit, since there’s nothing which even a willing user can read for themselves, and is vulnerable to potentially capricious interpretations by the moderators.
Maybe that’s what the community wants but I see it as elitist, suitable for an already-cohesive splinter group but not very welcoming, it’s “my way or the highway” not “our way and your refuge too”.
But if someone insists on following the rules to the letter, to the harm of the community, the strongest weapon against him is a very explicit rule that tells him that he’s violating the rules, to the letter. In other words, if you follow the rules to the letter, then you must follow also that rule to the letter, but that rule tells you that you are not supposed to do it to begin with.
But the counter-argument to that is that this other bad thing the person is doing, that you never thought to explicitly prohibit, is ok because you don’t have a rule against it. If your rules convey spirit and not precise implementation, moderators are free to invoke the spirit of the rules; if your rules have a long list of specific requirements and prohibitions, you invite people to scrutinize that list for loopholes.
I’ve always liked R’ Hillel’s formation: what is hurtful to you, do not do to others. Sure that leaves gaps (maybe I don’t feel hurt by X but you do), but it’s a good baseline philosophy. Start with “do no harm” and then look at positive commandments from there.
I see your point. I’ll add something about that to the lede, rather than as a rule of its own - I’d rather not make the list of rules longer, because that’s the bit most people will read, but enforcement can rely on any of it.
At some point, any community has to rely on its moderators to do what they were put in that place to do. This is particularly the case with elected moderators, as the community has explicitly put trust in them. I tend to lean towards relying on moderator judgement because it’s more flexible than rules: moderators know what is and isn’t okay, and should be trusted to enforce that correctly. Complaints and misconduct are a separate issue.
Assuming for now that we’d rather not try to explicitly define types of behaviour that we don’t want, what else could we do to make this feel more welcoming? I personally don’t think it’s unwelcoming, but I am but one person; if there are improvements we could make, let’s make them.
That’s not the case with me though: I’m not an elected moderator and I don’t even know one.
Also I don’t know that anyone votes for the CoC, that might instead be a doctrine that’s imposed by the host (e.g. by SE) and defines the framework or the rules of engagement which users are supposed to be able to read and understand - and which moderators both enforce and are themselves bound by.
Sorry I think my own writing style is terrible at being welcoming or sounding natural.
In case you’re interested though, as feedback here’s how my inner monolog subtitles what you’ve written.
Be respectful and polite
“Is that ‘better say nothing – children should be seen and not heard, speak when spoken to but otherwise listen to their betters’?”
Treat others how you would like to be treated.
(You’ve heard my views about that already, above)
Presume good faith
“People might be mean to you, or swear like sailors, but don’t you say anything out of line. Remain timid.”
“We all know how to swear but at least let’s pretend: that we usually keep our trousers on here.”
“And ‘keep it’ is colloquial, slang: so this community is a monoculture, so, beware (which is aka be very afraid).”
“Now you’re talking (i.e. I warm to what you’re saying). This is prescriptive not proscriptive, tells me how I should and may behave and what I can give (i.e. “constructive feedback”).”
“Yes.” (i.e. ditto, I am warm to this)
“And yes. SE went a little further, saying to focus on the content not the person – ‘no ad hominem’ is how I call that.”
IOW I thought it didn’t start well. Maybe if it were a bit permissive to begin with, instead of starting with a “don’t be naughty” – maybe a mission statement or a definition of what’s on-topic, the extent to which commentary or extended dialog might be welcome, when to change the topic and how to know when to stop, whether new people are welcome or whether this is a “closed user group”.
You seem to have completely misunderstood what I wrote (as in, reading almost the exact opposite of what I meant to say). Maybe it’s because of some lost context (the lack of threading in Discourse isn’t very helpful in maintaining that).
Therefore the whole thing now in a complete package, without back-references, in a clearly structured package.
The goal is that the rules are to be interpreted to the spirit, not to the letter.
I think that should be uncontroversial (and I think that is the point where you completely misunderstood me; I definitely do not want to encourage applying the rule to the letter).
It is a matter of fact that there are people that insist on interpreting the rules to the letter.
I think there is no questioning of that.
Since those people exist, we want to convince them not to do that. Which on first view sees to be a hopeless endeavour because those people will just point to the rules as written and say “but that’s what the rule says!”
And here is where luap42’s anti-rule-lawyering clause comes in:
Follow the spirit of the rules, not the letter.
For anyone already following the spirit of the rules, this sentence brings nothing new. But if someone insist on the letter of the rules, it gives you something to point at and say “here, this rule explicitly says you are wrong. You cannot follow the letter of the rule without violating this rule to the letter. So your insistence of interpreting the rules to the letter contradicts the rules. And it explicitly does so, in an interpretation to the letter.
And in this way, it ensures that following the rules to the letter is not a viable option.
Note that the reply I replied to was a reply specifically to luap42’s post stating that rule (and that rule only). I in no way did want to imply that we should have explicit rules for everything (quite the contrary).
I hope I have cleared up all misunderstandings now.
Apparently I do think the opening is infantile, which colors the rest – not literally infantile, but “Treat others how you would like to be treated” is preschool-age IMO – safe for work, but immature and volatile.
And using the word “jerk” instead is, not an improvement – I find that hostile or inflammatory to begin with.
@cwellsx I understand the problem. We are struggling to come up with language that is:
Serious without being too lawyer/formal
Friendly without being childish
Complete without being extremely long
It is not an easy task. As far as “preschool-age”, part of me reacts right away with:
“Everything I need to know I learned in kindergarten”
There are some people out there (and I am not referring to anyone currently in this discussion) who appear to have missed the lessons about sharing, politeness, etc. that they should have learned in kindergarten
And of course a large part of the problem is that the people who want to abide by a reasonable Code of Conduct are actually likely to do so even without being asked. And those who don’t want to abide by a reasonable Code of Conduct, will do what they are going to do (and cause problems for the rest of us) no matter what the Code of Conduct says or how it is presented.
So it almost doesn’t matter what is in the Code of Conduct. Except that there are some items (e.g., “safe for work”) that really do need to be stated because there can be situations where perfectly reasonable people (i.e., not intentionally offending others, not trolls, not spammers) use language in ways that we as a group generally want to keep out of this system for a variety of reasons.
I second this. (I am writing this extra post, because I disagree with some other parts of your post, but still wanted to say that I think this is a good idea.)
There are some popular short answers there – I posted a long answer, which I wouldn’t how to summarise. That may not solve the problem at hand, but if it’s a topic that you want to study further then you might find further inspiration there.
Yes well I didn’t mind “safe for work” – it was the “Keep it!” that sounded like some gruff barkeeper threatening to cosh a drunk (instead of, a preschool teacher).
As a tech writer I was taught to aim for like a grade 6 to 8 vocabulary and grammar as far as possible – maybe a 10- or 12-year-old. That’s, old enough to be adult and for abstract concepts (like “kind”), not too complicated in its expression – including for English as a second language (“non-English” being another concept which, I don’t know, may or may not be applicable to the community of Writers).
So are there then, you say, situations which should be spelled out?
What do you think of just the central section of the Covenant – that’s not too long, is it?
Our Standards
Examples of behavior that contributes to a positive environment for our community include:
Demonstrating empathy and kindness toward other people
Being respectful of differing opinions, viewpoints, and experiences
Giving and gracefully accepting constructive feedback
Accepting responsibility and apologizing to those affected by our mistakes, and learning from the experience
Focusing on what is best not just for us as individuals, but for the overall community
Examples of unacceptable behavior include:
The use of sexualized language or imagery, and sexual attention or advances of any kind
Trolling, insulting or derogatory comments, and personal or political attacks
Public or private harassment
Publishing others’ private information, such as a physical or email address, without their explicit permission
Other conduct which could reasonably be considered inappropriate in a professional setting
It’s quite woolly, a lot of lee-way for a moderator’s interpretation.
And not too long – it’s five “yes” and five “no” (where “seven” is canonically the most a person might read).
“Contributes to a positive environment” is a bit high-fallutin’ but the license does allow you to “adapt” it.
If I were to adapt the above slightly I might try:
Our Standards
Be nice:
Demonstrate empathy and kindness toward other people
Be respectful of differing opinions, viewpoints, and experiences
Give and gracefully accept constructive feedback
Be helpful:
Keep the discussion on-topic (as described ?where?)
Learn from experience and from good examples, and from any moderators’ input
Focus on what is best, not just for us as individuals, but for the overall community
And never publish:
Sexualized language or imagery, sexual attention, or advances of any kind
Trolling, insulting or derogatory comments, nor personal or political attacks
Public or private harassment
Others’ private or personally identifying information, their name or address for example, without their explicit permission
Anything “not safe for work” – or inappropriate in a professional or public or all-ages setting
There is nothing even close to a universal “on topic” as different communities vary considerably in the leeway allowed surrounding the “official topic”. But there will always be something - it is the one thing that every Community must customize.
I think actually referring to the Community’s specs (which can be done generically as I already noted) is the way to go. Otherwise, for example, “shopping questions” (which are off-topic in many sites, for good reason) would logically still be OK because they are relevant to the question at the time.
For those who don’t already know, shopping questions are typically off-topic because the information becomes obsolete relatively quickly.
… then – and assume that people reading know what the topic is, because it is defined somewhere else.
It’s all still boilerplate – it is now “long enough to cover the subject” etc.
And it’s all imperative – which helps to make it brief – it’s technical writing not copywriting, good enough perhaps.
If you could make it friendlier or funny then maybe better; I think it’s informative now – i.e. what the expectations are, without trying to teach you how to do that.
To check the diff of the new version against the original version at the top of this topic:
“Respectful” still exists (in ‘my’ draft of the Covenant), the rest of this phrase is gone, now with a more detailed list of imperatives instead.
Also gone. I don’t like because it assumes that people will be tempted to perceive bad faith. I’d prefer that “good faith” went without saying (and specify what behaviour is expected, not what faith).
There’s no "“no ad hominem” in the new version but you wanted moderators to intervene … if that (i.e. “no ad hominem”) is one of the places where moderators draw a line, maybe that can be a rule for the moderators to express instead of in the CoC.
This is rewritten. I kept “safe for work”, the Covenant had “professional setting”, and I added “all ages”.
The Convenant had that as “gracefully” rather than “good spirits”. I don’t know whether you require that second sentence too i.e. “don’t force it”. If you wanted, you might
Give and gracefully accept constructive feedback
Gracefully offer, and accept, or decline, constructive feedback
This is a repetition of the “good faith” message and again assumes there’ll be accidents (and is gone).
Maybe the newer bit, about learning from experience, and there being moderators, is better (and much shorter).
Instead of this we detail 6 different kinds of “not okay” – plus, 4 or more other kinds, which are the converse of what are okay.
That’s not exhaustive, maybe, but pretty detailed.
But there’s nothing currently in my draft of the Covenant about “reporting it”.
“[…] if someone tells you they don’t want feedback, don’t force it on them”: not sure what this is getting at. Criticism of posts is as much, or more, for the benefit of readers as for that of the writer; it’d be very odd to give writers an opt out.
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