[totalcrepe]

No, they "often" ask people to cancel and state personal grounds or scheduling conflict, etc. Much like suspicious resignations. Then they get wierder when people refuse but the facts are then confusing nonsense about inflexibility and inability to reach a concensus, not a statement of vague unease about a speaker.

Given the terrible track record of the JS community with regards to basic behavior, I really have to wonder what is wrong and why anyone should risk their personal reputation by doing public activities in JS.

Perhaps transpiling purely to avoid interacting with caustic elements of the JS community will be the new normal.

[curioussavage]

This ^^

Their whole handling of the situation was incredibly unprofessional. Really makes the whole conference sound like utter crap if they can't even handle something like that like adults.