On Thu, April 18, 2013 8:34 am, Carsten Bormann wrote: > On Apr 18, 2013, at 17:17, "Dan Harkins" <dharkins@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote: > >> Why is this a problem? > > I think you are more likely to ask this question if you think that if it > is a "problem", then we *have* to "solve" it, e.g. by shooting enough of > the white male people in the IETF that the numbers balance. > > It is not that kind of "problem". Well that's a relief! As a white male (I know, a surprise, right?) I'm glad to know I am not going to get shot. > It is, however, a situation that a > sizable part of the community have experience with. I have been attended at least 40 IETFs over the past 18 years or so. I certainly have experience with this situation. What is new, though, is the statement that this situation is, in fact, a problem. > The experience that, > if you find ways to improve diversity where the cure is *not* worse than > the ailment, the quality of the work actually improves from that. What is this "cure" of which you speak? This diversity discussion has included statements like: "If the intent is to emphasize diversity (for some metric) over one of the core skills [technical clue, admin skills, ability to work with others], that's certainly possible." and, "A small point to watch for, if there is a focus on a defined list of groups [and there certainly appears to be one-- gender], is the difference between discriminating /against/, versus ensuring representation /from/." So? Are we going to emphasize diversity over core skills? Say that one's gender or skin color matters more than their technical clue or their ability to work with others? By what method are we going to "ensure" representation? And what do we do if these efforts have not resulted in the proportions that are deemed to be acceptable? Use a little more force? Quotas? Nobody has stated what the "cure" is for this situation so we don't know whether it will be worse than the ailment. There is a huge gap between "encouraging more women to volunteer" and "shooting white men". And I really don't think we need to count the gender make-up of a meeting if our "cure" was going to something close to "encouraging more women to volunteer." regards, Dan.