Re: Last Call: <draft-farrresnickel-harassment-05.txt> (IETF Anti-Harassment Procedures) to Best Current Practice

[Stewart Bryant <[e-mail]>]

On 11/03/2015 13:41, Yoav Nir wrote:
>> On Mar 11, 2015, at 11:45 AM, Stewart Bryant <[e-mail]> wrote:
>>
>> On 10/03/2015 21:59, Jari Arkko wrote:
>>> I wanted to say that I’m in agreement with Adrian on this. Ultimately,
>>> no list will be complete, some judgment needs to apply, and I
>>> think we’ve covered this in the text better than if we attempted
>>> to expand the list.
>>>
>>> (And I am, of course, in agreement with Stewart that things that
>>> he lists are definitely important and certainly should not be misused
>>> in any professional discussion.)
>>>
>>> Jari
>>>
>> Jari
>>
>> I fail to see why the IETF which has no significant expertise
>> in this area has chosen to make up its own list rather than
>> using one put together by professionals.
>>
>> I did not just think up those additional items, they are part
>> of a list that experts on the subject put together for
>> example:
>>
>> http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2010/15/contents
> This kind of list is always based on bad experience. Such lists never include blood type or hair color for the simple reason that these attributes have not been used as a basis for discrimination or harassment (dumb blonde jokes aside).
>
> This particular list is based on the experience in Europe, perhaps even more specifically in the UK. The experience within the IETF may be far different.
I would be interested to know which countries have a reduced list 
because of intrinsically better behavior as opposed to the enshrinement 
of unacceptable behavior into law? The point about the characteristics 
is that they are fundamentally human and thus highly likely to be 
applicable.
>
> Is there age discrimination in the IETF? Does age need to be a protected characteristic?
Now that is a really interesting question isn't it. I suspect that there 
is and thus it does.

> I could honestly ask the same question for most of the other characteristics in that list.On the other hand that list does not include characteristics such as employment and nationality that are very likely to come up in the IETF.
>
> We’ve had a call to remove a chair in the IRTF based on his employer last year, and people are often judged based on how “cool” their employer is (Google and Cisco are cool. Microsoft? Not so much) as well as based on their country (Russia is not cool right now. Finland always is)
I have no objection to the lengthening of the list, although I note that 
at one level employer discrimination is fundamental to our operation in 
that we often decline someone who might be the better chair or AD on 
affiliation grounds in order to achieve an affiliation balance.
>
> So I don’t think that list is appropriate for us.
>
Well note that many of those items are actually on the list already, and 
to list one that is  not, but which I explicitly raised, there is the 
issue of disability discrimination and I do not see how that can be 
tolerated?

- Stewart