Re: Bad/Good ideas and damage control by experienced participants

[Tim Bray <[e-mail]>]

The below from Tom Petch captures my opinion.  I have sympathy with more or
less all the notes from all the factions in this discussion, which
instantly stops when they say or imply “… and that’s why it’s OK to be
rude.”  I just don’t think that’s ever OK in the context of an open-to-all
mailing list representing the public face of something that claims to be a
standards organization.  That includes when discouraging a dumb idea that
is being proposed for the seventeenth time.
On Wed, Jun 22, 2022 at 1:32 AM tom petch <[e-mail]> wrote:

> I think that that exemplifies a universal truth that is often missed and
> is perhaps the core of this discussion.
>
> First, criticise the behaviour never the person.
> Second, own it; not 'that is stupid' but 'I think that ...' ideally with
> logical reasons, never with emotional ones.
>
> It took me a long time to realise how much nicer the world is when I
> remember this and, even now, I sometimes need to remind myself (as in
> opposing the adoption of an I-D which I am about to do).  I would
> sacrifice all the spell-checkers in the world for a reasonableness
> checker along these lines.
>
> Tom Petch
>
>