Re: [Gendispatch] draft charter text: terminology-related WG

[Jay Daley <[e-mail]>]

Speaking as a non-white person with extensive personal experience of racism there are a couple of strawmen I would like to address:

Having wealthy, credentialed, white people take the issue of diversity and inclusivity seriously enough to try to explicitly and publicly change their behaviours is to me neither patronising nor disempowering, but rather it is both heartening and solidarity building.  The alternative of wealthy, credentialed, white people not wishing to do that makes me wary that either they are racist, or sympathise with racists, or seek to diminish or ignore the historic impact of racism.  To use modern terminology, the difference is between feeling "safe" and "unsafe".

This wariness directly affects participation - if there is a decision to be made on where to direct resources then (on average) the "unsafe" organisation loses out.

Jay

-- 
Jay Daley
IETF Executive Director
[e-mail]