Accountability of the CoCC

[Matthias Koeppe]

All: We elected a Code of Conduct Committee earlier this year.

The committee, ostensibly, is following the manual at
https://github.com/sagemath/sage/blob/develop/CODE_OF_CONDUCT_COMMITTEE.md

I have severe concerns, at the core of which are:
1. the complete and willful refusal by the committee to recognize and
address abuse (
https://github.com/sagemath/sage/blob/develop/CODE_OF_CONDUCT_COMMITTEE.md#clear-and-severe-breach-actions),
2. the public defamation of community members who have become targets of abuse.

I suggest that we amend the guide to specify the following:

1. Strict term limits for committee members.
2. A procedure for initiating an election of new members of the
committee, in particular for cases when the existing committee members
are unable or unwilling to perform their duties.
3. A clear recusal protocol.
4. A procedure for the disqualification of members of the committee.
5. A method for ensuring accountability of the committee.

Matthias
--
Dr. Matthias Koeppe . . . . . . . . http://www.math.ucdavis.edu/~mkoeppe
Professor of Mathematics

[Martin R]

Dear Matthias!

You write:

I have severe concerns, at the core of which are:
1. the complete and willful refusal by the committee to recognize and

address abuse (https://github.com/sagemath/sage/blob/develop/CODE_OF_CONDUCT_COMMITTEE.md#clear-and-severe-breach-actions),

2. the public defamation of community members who have become targets of abuse. 

These are *very* severe accusations.  Obviously I do not know about any private abusive messages you get.  I am sorry to hear that.

However, I am not aware of any public defamation, neither of you nor of other developers.  This is something I should not have seen, since I do follow sage-devel and sage-release, and I frequently follow discussions on github issues and pull requests.

Could you please explain what you are experiencing?

I think I should openly add, that quite frequently I find the language you use and some statements you make very hard to bear.  It seems to me that you are pushing decisions instead of seeking consensus (eg., "Trust those who are doing the work."), and that you ignore requests of co-developers (eg., to not use the "eyes" emoji).  I am not sure whether you are aware of the fact that this troubles me deeply.

Best wishes,

Martin