Hi, First off I want to say that I know you don't know me from a bar of soap, so thank you for taking the time to reply thoughtfully and earnestly. I'll cut out the bits that I don't think I can build on. On Tue, 10 Sep 2019 at 02:54, Keith Moore <moore@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote: > On 9/7/19 6:15 PM, Matthew Kerwin wrote: >> Asking every recipient to modify their human/emotional response to a >> message's structure/terseness/choice of words/idioms/etc. seems much >> less effective than asking the one sender to be conscious of it when >> writing. Best when they both happen, together, of course. (It's easier >> to read in good faith if you have a sense that the writer wrote in >> good faith.) > > I'm surprised that you and others seem to think it is > easy for a sender to anticipate how their message will be read. > > Last I knew, the IETF list had tens of thousands of recipients. > (Granted, that was a long time ago, so my information may be outdated.) > Different readers will naturally react to the same message in different > ways. Asking every sender to anticipate the spectrum of reactions from > every recipient and write their message to avoid all potential of > adversely affecting the listeners' emotional states, seems much less > effective than expecting recipients to consider that writers who come > from a wide spectrum of backgrounds are going to think and speak > differently from one another. I think I might have a problem talking about things on the idealism-pragmatism spectrum -- my daughter always complains that I expect perfection from her when I ask for small improvements. On one hand, if anticipating reactions was easy then we wouldn't have a problem; set the bar, and swing the ban-hammer when the bar isn't reached. But on the other hand, I'm not asking anyone to anticipate responses, I'm asking everyone to be conscious that messages will have a personal/human/subjective response that won't always be based on the actual meaning of the words. That could mean: try to scan the message with fresh eyes (easy, I know), see if there's anything that would be easy to interpret another way. It could also mean: be prepared to receive a response that gives subtext (real or imagined) more emphasis than it deserves, and accept that there was a communication hiccup, and try to work over or around it. It could mean other things, too. > As you point out, these are not mutually exclusive. There is a need > for due care on the part of both the author and the readers. But it's > not like there's some simple set of rules that an author can follow to > avoid creating distracting emotional states on a reader's part. No, definitely not. Absolutely agree. And trying to make, let alone enforce, rules to that effect is... a bad idea. I think building a common vocabulary and a way to discuss these issues, and a way for the community to realise its expectations, is a much more worthwhile effort. > For example, you cited "terseness". An author may deliberately be > terse because the author believes that readers are more likely to read > and understand a brief message than a lengthy one. Or maybe an author > will compose a terse reply to acknowledge having read a message, but > feel like it's not appropriate or wise to burden the list with a > lengthy reply. Maybe that author feels like it's a pointless > argument, or that it's been gone over many times with no new conclusion > or understanding. A different author, or the same author in a > different circumstance, may judge it more effective to go into detail. > > One reader may interpret a terse message as an insult, especially if > the reader sees that message as being directed at them and expected to > have a conversation on the topic. Another reader may be grateful that > the message was easy to read or that a lengthy conversation didn't > ensue. It's worth pointing out, I chose "terseness" over brevity or conciseness specifically because 'terse' isn't intrinsically negative, but is very often taken that way. Being abrupt isn't the same thing as being efficient, but the difference is pretty hard to pin down. But, yes, "length of message" is not a good heuristic. > There probably are concrete writing suggestions that could be made that > would be helpful. But "tone" means whatever a reader wants it to mean, > or is predisposed to think it means (deliberately or not), based on > that reader's culture, education, conditioning, and experiences. > The same is true for "professional", "polite", and any of several other > vague descriptions. We pay lawyers to deal with legal stuff; we have plenty of technical people to deal with technical stuff. I wonder if we should hire someone from the humanities to help provide guidance and advice on stuff that involves humans. > A big concern I have is with the idea that it's the sender's fault if > the sender accidentally pushed some reader's buttons. While there > are some buttons that are widely shared among humans, there are many > that are not. Yes, although my largest concern in that regard is the word "fault". I don't know how to articulate it well, but attributing fault and blaming someone and punishing someone all seem like... the extreme end of a spectrum that we, hopefully, hardly ever need wander down. Although I acknowledge that the thing that set all this off was just that. I hope everyone accepts that that was a mistake. (Sorry for using "that" too much.) > Add to this the fact that criticizing people's "tone" is a very common > way of attacking people and/or ideas for political gain. That makes > vague demands about "tone" extremely dangerous. That's true, but using tone (being rude/aggressive, making people feel unsafe or, at least, unwelcome) is also a very common way of doing it. It's also much older, more established, and I guess* possibly harder to detect or recognise (or dislodge) in some situations because of that familiarity/inertia/whatever. I know my personal bias is to lean more heavily in one direction when contention arises, but I also recognise it is my personal bias. * I Am Not A Humanities > Finally, when a small number of appointed individuals take on the role > of deciding whose "tone" is "appropriate", with no transparency or > community oversight, it creates a very dangerous locus of political > control over the organization - even if those individuals never > actually silence people because of their perceived "tone". Yes. That is bad. > Of course, when those same individuals are empowered to silence > contributors because of their "tone", any pushback from those > individuals carries with it an implied threat whether or not this is > intended. Yes. That is worse. > So not only do I think "tone policing" is inappropriate for IETF, I > think it's doubly inappropriate if the SAAs take on that job. I think the community should have a mechanism for establishing and evolving standards of interaction and behaviour, but I don't think there should be a locus, as you put it, of power. Jury over judge. That's why I think it's valuable to discuss the topic, so we can build a common language and gain an understanding of individuals' and the general community's position. But not so we can write a law. >> None of this is about policing or enforcement, mind. I don't even want >> to think about that until we understand what it is that would be being >> enforced. > > The mere hint of a threat of policing or enforcement, of something that > is completely subjective, is frightening. Cheers -- Matthew Kerwin https://matthew.kerwin.net.au/
