From the comments.. for anyone that didn't scroll all the way:<p><i>Before "apologizing", you need to come clean: did you lie?</i><p><i>Earlier, you (Stack Exchange) wrote:</i><p>><i>We removed a moderator for repeatedly violating our existing Code of Conduct and being unwilling to accept our CM’s repeated requests to change that behavior.</i><p><i>However, Monica disputed that she had received repeated requests to change her behavior.</i><p><i>Clearly one party here is lying, and much of the community believes that party is Stack Exchange.</i><p><i>So—did you lie, or not? Your "apology" is meaningless until you clean this up.</i>
From a comment by rolfl[0]:<p>> <i>This apology has come not a moment too soon.... for the past days, almost a week, now, moderators from across most sites have collaborated on communicating our concerns to the SE staff. We have been working "in plain sight" of the SE staff (using the TL to collaborate). ... The timing of this apology appears to have been in a race to beat our statements about the issues.</i><p>The comment was updated to include a link to <a href="https://meta.stackexchange.com/questions/334575/dear-stack-exchange-a-statement-and-a-letter-from-your-moderators" rel="nofollow">https://meta.stackexchange.com/questions/334575/dear-stack-e...</a> , which in turn links to: <a href="https://dearstackexchange.com" rel="nofollow">https://dearstackexchange.com</a> .<p>[0] <a href="https://meta.stackexchange.com/a/334570/346001" rel="nofollow">https://meta.stackexchange.com/a/334570/346001</a>
I think these are the main previous threads, in reverse order:<p><a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21173643" rel="nofollow">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21173643</a><p><a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21153224" rel="nofollow">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21153224</a><p><a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21149770" rel="nofollow">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21149770</a><p><a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21113344" rel="nofollow">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21113344</a>
Codes of conduct tend to be driven by (and serve to protect) the group's intended purpose. Gender is a big part of our language for many reasons, some better than others. We should be aware of our goals when dictating what is and isn't acceptable, <i>especially</i> on a technical Q&A forum like StackExchange.<p>Wanting to know someone's gender can be reasonable. But... on StackExchange? I can count on a single set of digits the number of times I've personally witnessed someone knowing someone else's gender leading to anything better than a neutral outcome. Doctors factor highly in that list. Then dates. Online people... well, only when it was extremely on-topic. Like a time I saw someone getting advice on 6-point racing harnesses vs. 5-point (re: strap geometry to protect the lower body).<p>As an example, let's take scicomp.stackexchange.com (computational science). Neither a participant's sex nor their gender is an appropriate topic there, with few exceptions. Is a reasonable policy there to avoid <i>all</i> gendered pronouns when referring to other users, unless there's an on-topic reason? Is using "they" or the user's handle <i>worse</i> than bringing gender into the conversation, when this is clearly off-topic? Monica seems to be negotiating for the <i>option</i> to use gender-neutral language. What are the pitfalls if we mandate it? The language can be a little awkward at first but that's a small molehill to die on.<p>Personally, I've always found it strange that we collectively broadcast our gender so far and wide. We don't continually mention each other's race, hair color, handedness, or preferred sleeping position on every tenth word, yet we often know someone's gender even before we know their name. Why is it so?<p>Thoughts? Very curious to hear from others. To be clear I have no problem with someone expressing their sexuality, gender, or other aspects of their individuality. I'm a fairly odd cat myself (particulars are irrelevant) and I relish being able to express myself authentically when it's helpful to some goal. I guess I'm mostly challenging the central role gender plays in our language, and asking whether or not we should change this to allow people more flexibility in what they disclose.
> We made a decision to act quickly, which I personally approved, but in doing so skipped several critical parts of the process.<p>Okay, got it. Acting in haste can lead you to make critical errors of judgment. Smart to slow down so you don't make the same mistake again.<p>> On Monday, October 7, we’ll be sharing a second draft of an update to our Code of Conduct with all moderators for feedback.<p>Good call. Get feedback on the revised plan from the moderators to whom it will apply. Smart move.<p>> On Thursday, October 10, the update to the Code of Conduct will be announced publicly.<p>Wait, what?<p>You just said that you need to slow things down because you acted too quickly the last time and ended up screwing things up and causing a lot of pain, which is the reason you're apologizing in the first place.<p>And now the timeline between "solicit feedback" and "release document publicly" is three days?<p>How in the world are you going to be able to thoughtfully incorporate any feedback other than typo corrections and still meet this deadline?<p>There is no reason to solicit feedback unless you actually plan to listen to it and to be prepared for that feedback to say that the draft still needs work. But this timeline does not allow enough time for that to happen.
I can’t follow what they’re apologising for because I don’t have the context on what happened. Understandably, they don’t elaborate on their mistakes and instead focus on the apology.<p>Can anyone give a short summary of what happened?
The answer by Squeamish Ossifrage is interesting because they try to call out SO on a variety of stuff that sounds like what any other large tech company tries to do, with the slow and steady tactics of trying to gain more control or power and encroaching on user rights. [0]<p>It's also interesting to ponder if the StackOverflow community format is subjecting them to more calls of transparency than other sites might get.<p>[0] <a href="https://meta.stackexchange.com/a/334573" rel="nofollow">https://meta.stackexchange.com/a/334573</a>
> <i>We’ll keep those discussions (with the erstwhile mod) completely private unless we both agree to share any of it with the community.</i><p>Does this mean they're looking to prevent the mod from speaking out unless SE agrees to public release? Or is the first "we" (in "We'll") different from the second we ("unless we both")? Hopefully this is just sloppy/rushed drafting, not forced secrecy.
> First of all, we hurt members of our LGBTQ+ community when they felt they couldn’t participate authentically and we didn’t respond quickly or strongly enough in supporting them. Worse, through our handling of this situation, we made them a target for harassment as people debated their right to express themselves and be addressed according to how they identify.<p>So wait - what are they apologizing for?<p>If I understand this situation correctly there are basically two sides:<p>- The people who put in place the new code of conduct, who think that they "hurt members of our LGBTQ+ community when they felt they couldn't participate authentically..." by not putting this code of conduct in place fast enough.<p>- The moderator who fired/the people who resigned who think they "hurt members of our LGBTQ+ community when they couldn't participate authentically..." when they put in place the new poorly thought out policy<p>Is this intended to double (triple? quadruple?) down on the original position? Or apologize for it and move to the second?
I would encourage Monica to watch out for any "Let's keep this private" language. In situations like this one some organizations have tried to disempower people by barring them from discussion with advisors, family or others.<p>Another way they do this is by saying, as in the apology "keep those discussions completely private unless we both agree to share any of it with the community" but they will phrase it as a binding agreement.
> Worse, through our handling of this situation, we made [members of the LGBTQ+ community] a target for harassment as people debated their right to express themselves and be addressed according to how they identify<p>I wonder how is that possible, the QA are as anonymous as each user wants to be and regarding QA, is there any question in which people cannot ask anything and should not be replied with a proper rationalized argumentation?<p>How does it help a bullied child to be the protected kid of the teacher? In the other hand the day we stop having open debates, QA and knowledge, we will be going backwards in scientific evolution, no matter what the topic is.
My cynical self noticed that there are a lot of "apologize" and "sorry" in this update, yet I believe this is a first good step.<p>However, the update accumulated to the 'fix' being SO will release an updated CoC on Oct 7/10/11 with inputs from all mods, and an updated mod firing process. These are absolutely essential, no doubt, but incomplete.<p>What is missing, in my opinion, is the update still did not address how the original conflict came to the firing of a respected member. The most sincere way to apologize would be to use this failure of process as an example, to showcase how SO erred and how SO intends to change. Finally, a separate, public apology to the fired mod, with specific example of how SO mishandled each step, is crucial in regaining the trust.<p>EDIT: After giving some thoughts, I realize that SO is apologizing, not for wrongful termination, but for not privately firing the mod with due process. In SO's management eyes, the firing is still justified. Fine. Explain to us, with examples, how the firing is justified, and how pronoun usage would re-conciliate with moderators with religion restrictions.
Does anyone else find it ironic that Stack Exchange, a company which replaced a website that was often misnamed "ExpertSexchange", is now going through controversy related to the misnaming of sexchanged people?
Mostly another non-apology. Not sorry for what they did, but for doing it arbitrarily, without following a procedure, and for not taking account of the Jewish holiday Monica was observing. Instead of just imposing the CoC they’re going to rush it through three days of discussion, then impose it.
This is so dumb. Just disallow people to use real names and switch to aliases completely. Voila! Nobody needs to know or worry about anyone's genders or pronouns. It's a tech forum, nobody should give a shit about your gender or lack thereof.
> First of all, we hurt members of our LGBTQ+ community when they felt they couldn’t participate authentically<p>> thank you for acknowledging that. I will be able to sleep in peace tonight knowing that I have still a place here<p>If users were genuinely unable to sleep because one random faceless person asked if they could continue their practice of only using gender neutral pronouns, then this seems to be a situation in which you shouldn't apologise to them, because they'll never be satisfied. It must be a nightmare being assigned to a CoC project now.
In legal cases, it often happens that the first person to be accused of violating a new regulation often gets a slap on the wrist.<p>For example, if a brand new tax regulation is vague, the first person accused of violating that regulation has a drastically reduced penalty, or just a warning. Along with that, the judge writes a clarification so there can be no mistakes the next time. The clarification sends a clear message to the community that the next person accused will not get a break.<p>Perhaps, based on third or fourth party accounts, Monica was repeatedly asked to use specific pronouns in a moderators-only chat. If that is true, she may have driven one or more moderators away from participating there, and violated the existing CoC.<p>However, even if all those accusations against Monica are true, since there is no established procedure for removing a moderator, it would seem that the "judge(s)" in the new process to remove or re-instate Monica could walk a very fine line. The judge(s) could declare Monica guilty of those offenses, but give her a lenient sentence. Perhaps re-instated, but under probation or double-secret-probation.<p>I hope David Fullerton and his coworkers have the wisdom to consider this course of action.
Not sure I understand what happened and who why people were offended. If there's wrongdoing by SO, what does this have to do with a holiday(jewish or other)?<p>Thanks for clarifications and filling in the gaps for me.
I read this thread, read topvoted links to meta and still not sure if I get what’s happening.<p>Is it that ‘they’ does not count as a neutral addressing anymore? If yes, what’s the solution?
Whatever else anyone thinks of this brouhaha, I'd say that this answer is extremely useful: <a href="https://meta.stackexchange.com/a/334294" rel="nofollow">https://meta.stackexchange.com/a/334294</a>
Poor Stache Overflow. I left Debian as a dev when it finally became apparent that gender and identity politics were dominating the community. I originally joined for the technical aspect, which felt like a byproduct at the time I left again.
And I <i>am</i> a member of a fringe group. But I would never ever behave like most SJWs seem to do these days.
And now downvote me, for not agreeing with the underpriviledged.
Summary:<p>* contrition<p>* the moderator dismissal was too hasty<p>* they will create a process for reinstating moderators<p>* new Code of Conduct announced Oct 11
i mean... most people are already on the moderator side, but she might need to take it slow too. i might be reading all this wrong but she is coming off as the side that is slightly aggressive to me. she's been going at every single post they make or people on these post.<p>i mean, that wasn't like her job, was it? again i might be reading all this wrong or maybe we aren't being shown everything.
I used to participate in SO but it is really turning into a hit n run site for me now. Overzealous duplicate and notconstructive flags combined with the dumbing everything down for new users policy made it frustrating and unrewarding experience. It still is to be frank when the "answer matches actual question in title" rate is about 10%, but what else is there?
Totally unrelated to the matter of hand, but I find it amazing that SE now have forums like "Christianity", "Judaism" etc. where people can upvote and downvote religious questions and answers, and select the "accepted" answer about what Gods opinion is about this and that.<p>Edit: I didn't mean to imply that the answers are actually Gods opinion! Just found it fascinating that a site specifically designed for technical questions have grown to encompass questions about what Jesus meant with a certain phrase.
from my limited understanding of the issue some dude/dude-et got thrown out of Stack Overflow Moderators. Big deal to me stack exchange operates like a party you both add value and get value and if you shit in puch bowl you get thrown out. Now please let me know who shat or didnt shit in the punchbowl the contents of the shit and does anyone even drink fruit punch !! fight !!
You just have to look at the Twitter feeds of these two to see why things are going where they are going.<p><a href="https://twitter.com/SaraJChipps" rel="nofollow">https://twitter.com/SaraJChipps</a><p><a href="https://twitter.com/df07" rel="nofollow">https://twitter.com/df07</a>
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we hurt members of our LGBTQ+ community when they felt they couldn’t participate authentically and we didn’t respond quickly or strongly enough in supporting them. Worse, through our handling of this situation, we made them a target for harassment as people debated their right to express themselves and be addressed according to how they identify.<p>I am responsible for that, and I am deeply sorry. We absolutely support the LGBTQ+ community.
>><p>GPT-2 could have written a better and more genuine apology.<p>First of all, you don't just use the new PR formula of naming the wrong, saying you take responsibility and then saying you're sorry. You need to dig deep and identify why you committed the wrong in the first place (homophobia, sexism, mean heartedness?) and commit to therapy and reforming.<p>Seriously.