Re: [Recentattendees] IETF 100, Singapore -- proposed path forward and request for input

[Melinda Shore <[e-mail]>]

On 5/21/16 11:23 AM, Michal Krsek wrote:
> We as community need to weigh all conditions for the meeting, but I
> agree with Jordi statement - the meeting is for making the work
> done.

I think if you look through past posts, you'd be hard-pressed
to find anybody who's been more of an advocate for venue selection
based on ability to support work than I have been.  I've also been
very clear that I don't think that under our current set of
conditions there's really anything to prevent us meeting in
Singapore, which is truly unfortunate because there is absolutely
no question that Singapore criminalizes relationships between men.
Laws establishing this have been upheld by their highest court less
than two years ago.

However, the IETF has shown itself time and again to be
retrograde on diversity issues, whether it's the conditions that
allowed us to get into a situation where it never occurred to
anybody involved in the decision-making process that there might be
issues with Singapore, or hand-waving about the ridiculous
Bits-and-Bytes situation in Prague, or the ongoing issues with
leadership selection by the Nomcom.  And that's
really not okay - it's common for other technical communities to
be far more careful about these things.

> Please do not forget for those of us who simply can't afford to
> travel worldwide three times for year.

I've been self-funding for years, having to skip the occasional
meeting while chairing working groups and authoring documents
and contributing to technical work.  That's a different issue.

Anyway, given our organizational backwardness I really don't think
there's anything that can be done here.  As I said, I am making
a personal choice not to go to Singapore, but the broader situation
looks pretty intractible.

Melinda