Re: Harassment, abuse, accountability. and IETF mailing lists

[Miles Fidelman <mfidelman@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Keith Moore wrote:

On 6/9/22 07:40, Jay Daley wrote:

I think the problems arise when almost any attempt to be
critical is interpreted as being at least disrespectful even if
not actually rude.

That’s certainly a problem to watch out for along with other blatant abuses of power.

In my experience though, that is rare and what is far more common is a situation that begins with someone being both critical and rude at the same time, and then descends into a downward spiral of people talking across each other - one group for whom the rudeness is the main issue and and one group for whom the criticism is the main issue.  I often see those in the latter group interpreting any admonishment for the rudeness as targeting for being critical and therefore an abuse of power.

Some people take any kind of criticism of what they think is important, as rudeness.

And some people will use any tactic to shoot down a person or an idea that they don't like, including accusing the person advocating that idea of rudeness.

It's not that people can never be rude (they can), or that rudeness is a good thing (it's not).   But much of what people call rudeness is subjective and arbitrary.   If people can be shut down for rudeness, that inherently stifles a robust dialog aimed at discovering technical truth.   And that's why vague rules against rudeness are toxic to a consensus-making organization.

Ain't that the truth.

In my experience, folks who are good at what they do, both give and expect brutal design reviews.  Meanwhile folks who are easy on themselves, tend to be prickly and take offense easily - and drag conversations into exercises in blame & shame, rather than searches for truth (or at least usable approximations thereto).  Folks with Impostor Syndrome are the worst - can't take credit for their own capability, easy to take any comment as an attack.

And then there are the folks who kibbutz, without making meaningful contributions.  Pundits, trolls, wokeheads (excuse me, folks with savior complex), ... all variants on an authoritarian theme.  IMHO, Dunning-Kruger Syndrome, and "Wokeheadedness" (to coin a term), are flip sides of the same clueless, authoritarian coin.  (And then there are the folks who are intentional about it - the Soviets used to call them "Political Officers.")

Sigh....

Miles Fidelman
Someone who manages all too many lists, and has to deal with this garbage on a daily basis.  (And hasn't had enough coffee to allow this discussion to go by.)

-- 
In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice.
In practice, there is.  .... Yogi Berra

Theory is when you know everything but nothing works. 
Practice is when everything works but no one knows why. 
In our lab, theory and practice are combined: 
nothing works and no one knows why.  ... unknown