Re: [Recentattendees] Background on Singapore go/no go for IETF 100

[Lorenzo Colitti <[e-mail]>]

On Thu, May 26, 2016 at 7:08 AM, IAOC Chair <[e-mail]> wrote:

> Reasons for Cancellation of IETF 100 Meeting in Singapore, and the IAOC
> understands that to be:
>
> “    Singapore laws against same-sex relationships between men and
>     preventing the recognition of same-sex marriages could create
>     difficulties for same-sex partners and their children; these have
>     discouraged affected members of our community from participating
>     at the IETF meeting in November of 2017 and have also influenced
>     others to decline to attend in principled solidarity with them.
>

Independently of whether the meeting is cancelled for this reason or not,
it seems to me that if public/publicised, this sort of statement could
provide ammunition for critics of the IETF community to assert that the
IETF is not only (or no longer only) a technical organization but also a
political one. Is that something we want to get into?

Also, as a procedural matter: if the IAOC publicly makes such a statement
it could be interpreted as speaking for the IETF community. Can the IAOC do
that without rough consensus among IETF participants that that is a message
the community wants to send?

If the statement is not public/publicised, these concerns probably don't
apply. Obviously these discussion threads are public and anyone can read
them, but it would be hard for a third party convincingly to construe them
as the view of the IETF, as opposed to the views of individual IETF
participants. (Particularly because the number of people posting on the
topic is a small fraction of the number of meeting attendees, and thus a
smaller fraction of the community.)