[fritzx6]

It's definitely a difficult balance to strike, to provide guardrails for diverse groups of individuals, that ensure everyone can behave and be treated civilly.

I applaud you for your ability to stand up for yourself in moments of discomfort or where you feel others are being mistreated. Unfortunately, not everyone is as confident or as self-advocating as you, and a CoC can help protect those who are more likely to weather abuse in silence. Codes of Conduct serve several critical roles in large community gatherings but specifically they are a method for an event organizer to set expectations for acceptable behavior, this serves to:

1. Signal to attendees the atmosphere of inclusivity and tolerance which they can expect to experience (as a marginalized group or not)

2. Provide clear examples of inappropriate behavior so that individuals who are less proactive and self-confident do not dismiss their feelings for fear of being 'over-sensitive'

3. Ensure that transgressors cannot plead ignorance when they are admonished or removed for abusive behavior.

[mlang23]

And all the virtue signalling apparently leads to people like me, who are adults and can very well stand for themselves, not attending such conferences anymore. I truely think that people who are not willing or able to defend themselves in a social setting have bigger problems then FLOSS conferences. They have skipped a part of growing up. I feel sorry for them. But I dont agree that we should plaster everything with pseudo-laws to give them a false sense of security.

So it is apparently ok if the mentally weak feel welcome, and those which have learnt to defend themselves no longer showing up because they dont feel at home? Great, reminds me of one of the last interactions I had in a conference setting. Small children in the conference room. As a blind individual, I really rely on hearing what the speaker says. I cant just look at the slides. I already knew it wouldnt go well, but I tried to discuss the issue. At first, I heard some sympathy for my point of view. And 2 hours later, the same person didnt want to stand up for the issue anymore. So I guess womens right to bring their 1 year olds everywhere they want was trumping the needs of a disabled person attending the same conference. Thanks, I am done with this hypocrity.

[terracatta]

It sounds like you attended a poorly run conference that was not able to accommodate your disability and still refused to accommodate you after you were forced to self-advocate

All conferences I've been to are good about offering suggestions for near-by childcare or even on-site child care for all parents. If that wasn't offered, that's more evidence the conference wasn't run well. It's not appropriate to have a 1 year old babbling over a speaker giving a presentation and the organizers should have quietly spoke to the person caring for the child and removed them from the situation.

I don't think that has anything to do with CoCs.

[mlang23]

Its like fighting a windmill. The CoC was just established. And attendees were encouraged to bring their children. I guess the organizers didnt realize what can of worms they just opened, or they were not willing to reflect. I agree with your point of view, but I cant say that it would fit the reality I see and saw. In fact, what happened was exactly the reason why I am against CoCs: I was effectively silenced because I was afraid of the backlash I would get if I opened spoke out about children in the conference room. This is psychological terrorism, and I am not having it.

[fritzx6]

I am really sorry to hear you had such a negative experience at your recent conference. Small children can definitely be a disruption under any circumstances and I cannot imagine how difficult it would be to adequately hear a presenter with boisterous children nearby.

As to your first comment, I would urge you to extend some compassion to individuals who do not or cannot stand up for themselves. An individual who has been the victim of trauma or abuse is not inherently 'mentally weak' and did not necessarily 'skip a part of growing up'.

Consider for example:

In the late 90s and early 2000s it was a common part of the gamer vernacular to use the term 'rape' in a way that was synonymous with 'pwning', '0wning', or otherwise overwhelmingly beating someone in a game. This terminology was incredibly insensitive (and psychologically damaging) to gamers who were victims of sexual assault, and many venues and gaming communities had to introduce rules to forbid its usage (alongside other epithets and hurtful language).

These rules were not intended to give victims of abuse a 'false sense of security' they were intended to raise awareness within these communities for what was considered acceptable behavior, and to educate individuals who (despite acting without malice) did not consider the potential harm they might be causing others.

Likewise, someone who is part of a marginalized group, or someone who a Code of Conduct is intending to protect, should not need to independently apply social pressure to every individual who cannot conduct themselves with civility. That is an unfair burden of expectation to place on the shoulders of few, when the responsibility belongs to us all.

While I would love to live in a world where people can behave with empathy and compassion for others, the undeniable reality is that bad faith actors will always need some explicit rules. Otherwise, they will merely hide behind the façade of "No one said I couldn't do x, it's not against the rules!'.

And yes, I believe it is 'ok if the mentally weak feel welcome', I do not believe you should need to be an emotionally impervious hero to wish to attend a social or professional gathering.

[gattilorenz]

> And yes, I believe it is 'ok if the mentally weak feel welcome', I do not believe you should need to be an emotionally impervious hero to wish to attend a social or professional gathering.

That was not the question the op was asking, and you're misrepresenting his point by removing the second part.

Edit: The question was: assuming that there exist a risk that all this struggle for inclusivity will repel those people [from categories you are specifically trying to include] that already manage to fight and stand up for their rights, is the risk worth it? At least, that's how I read it.

And the answer can still be "yes", obviously, as long as we're clear about the question.