Re: perspective of discussion about I-D.farresnickel-harassment

[Jari Arkko <[e-mail]>]

Folks,

This is a difficult discussion.

But maybe we should try to get back from the most
recent part of the thread to the document, and see
how we can move forward.

I saw that Sam posted some discussion on the
alternate ways to address the issue that he had
brought up. Thank you.

But other than that, I wanted to up-level a bit and make
some observations.

First, we have an existing anti-harassment policy. We
believe we needed one, and I am happy about having it,
even if I am not happy that we live in a world that needs
one. We have also had an ombudsperson in our meetings.
That person, Linda Klieforth <[e-mail]>, is also
present at this IETF meeting and would be happy to talk to
anyone who has any concerns. I would like to do what we
can to ensure that the IETF is a safe, comfortable, and
easy place to discuss Internet technology. For everybody.

We are working on the current document because we
wanted to upgrade the policy from an IESG statement
to a community BCP and provide more detailed procedures.
This is an improvement. It is not the first IETF document
on the topic, and it probably won’t be the last. I do
believe in incremental improvement, however.

While we work on that improvement, please
remember that when we talk about human 
protocols, how we talk about them may create
perceptions by other people (as you can tell from
this thread), we may not be able to completely
avoid all bad cases, we may need lawyer/professional
input, the team that will eventually be put into place
will have community and professional parts*, etc. Please
be sensitive to these aspects that may be different
from your usual protocol specification experience.

Jari

*) My choice, not dictated by the document.