Version: 2024.01
Supercedes: All prior documents describing the Standards of Conduct and their enforcement.
In effect as of: August 1st, 2024
Note on capitalized imperative words in this document: The capitalized key words "MUST", "MUST NOT", "REQUIRED", "SHALL", "SHALL NOT", "SHOULD", "SHOULD NOT", "RECOMMENDED", "MAY", and "OPTIONAL" in this document are to be interpreted generally as described in IETF RFC 2119, updated in RFC 8174.
The Standards of Conduct, as they exist now, are primarily intended to provide a mechanism of response to problematic behavior at in-person events. On their face, they provide good guidance for attendees to identify and respond to violations. What the current Standards do not address, and what this document is intended to address, are the much broader sorts of abuse that are, in fact, a consistent problem in many of our sub-communities.
The nature of the Perl and Raku communities is, as it has always been, highly distributed, with individuals and groups leading various venues and systems to promote, maintain, and supply Perl and Perl modules to the world. It is impossible, therefore, for The Perl and Raku Foundation (hereafter, the Foundation) to provide and enforce a single Standards of Conduct for all Perl and Raku users and developers globally. The Board acknowledges this, and this document provides suitable scoping, to describe when it is to be held as applicable, and describe the range of potential enforcement actions that MAY be taken when a person is found to be in violation.
Abusive behavior in any form harms individuals, and the community as a whole, and if publicly aired and unmitigated, may affect the participation of donors to or employees, contractors, or volunteers of the Foundation. It is therefore in the interests of the Foundation to present these updated Standards of Conduct to the communities we serve.
These Standards will apply to actions in any venue, public or private, in-person or electronic, including conferences, workshops, email, chat services, or commit messages in any software repository, over which the Foundation has any financial interest by provision of funding, as well as cases in which either the offender or the target of the abuse is a volunteer for or is being paid for work on behalf of the Board, or any Board-supported activity or event.
Any sanction placed on any person by these Standards MAY apply to privileges of the community that are funded or provided by the Foundation, including conferences, email lists, public or private meetings or forums, grant application or receipt of grant funds, awards eligibility, or the ability to serve on the Board of the Foundation, or as a volunteer, contractor, or employee on behalf of the Board or on any Foundation-provided or funded activity.
Abuse comes in many forms, from physical abuse and violence or threats of violence, to sexual abuse – all thankfully rare in our communities – to abusive or harmful statements in person, on a messaging board, or via email. As Sawyer X described in his talk at TPRC Toronto in 2023, abuse can happen to anyone, and for any reason, or no reason. Sometimes the abusive behavior is inadvertent, collateral to an attempt to communicate on some other matter, and other times it is deliberate, and may include encouragement of abuse of the victim by others.
For your guidance, the Foundation presents these guidelines. These behaviors are examples of actions that are considered POSITIVE, and helpful to the development and maintenance of the community:
- Demonstrating empathy and kindness toward other people
- Being collaborative, sharing knowledge and information freely with others
- Being respectful of differing opinions, viewpoints, decisions and experiences
- Giving and gracefully accepting constructive feedback about technical matters
- Accepting responsibility and apologizing to those affected by our mistakes, and learning from the experience
- Focusing on what is best not just for us as individuals, but for the overall community
Examples of behavior considered NEGATIVE, unhelpful for the community, and therefore subject to possible sanction, include but are not limited to:
- The use of sexualized language or imagery, and unwelcome sexual attention or advances of any kind, either in-person or remotely
- Trolling, insulting or derogatory comments, and personal or political attacks
- Deliberate harassment or aggressive behavior toward others, in any form, public or private
- Intimidation or stalking
- Physical violence or unwelcome physical contact at in-person events, or any threat thereof
- Continued private contact via email, telephone, or private chat message after being asked to not contact someone in that way
- Displaying hatred or non-acceptance, via word or action, toward others based on their race, age, skin color, religion or lack thereof, nation of origin or residence, written or verbal native language, sex, gender or gender identity, sexuality, occupation or lifestyle, choices of programming language or other software, place or status of employment, marital status, current or former military service or lack thereof, or disability or lack thereof
- Publishing others’ private information, such as a physical, telephone, or email address, without their explicit permission
- Name-calling, in the guise of “feedback”
Hopefully, as adults, all members of the community understand these guidelines; the distinction between positive and negative behaviors is, the Board believes, starkly clear. However, more definitions are available further in this document, if needed.
In the case where negative behavior is brought to the attention of the Response Team, discussion and investigation will take place, to determine what happened, and what tools can be used to prevent the negative behavior from recurring. There won’t be any “public trials;” the discussion and the results will be visible only to the Response Team and the Board, to respect the privacy of all involved, until the Board has ratified the recommendations of the Response Team. Publishing information from the Board or Response Team on an incident in which you are not involved is itself a violation of these Standards (as such an action WILL be considered “publishing private information,” and MAY constitute harassment, as well), and MAY trigger action by the Response team to sanction the publisher of such information.
Sanctions have a wide range of possibilities – ranging from asking for and receiving an apology, to outright bans, and will be weighed by the Response Team and Board as appropriate.
These Standards of Conduct take effect upon the Board passing and publishing them, and no events or incidents prior to that time will be considered in any response by the Response Team or Board. The Board acknowledges that this allows past unresolved harms to stand, but we cannot in fairness enforce a set of guidelines ipso post facto. Suffice it to say, the Board believes that problem behaviors that have been ongoing will quickly run afoul of these Standards, and be dealt with accordingly.
Some more-specific, real-world examples of events or behavior that are in violation of these Standards include, but are not limited to:
- Sending abusive or bullying emails to a Board member, Board employee or contractor, volunteer, or grant recipient, when connected with the course of their work on behalf of the Foundation.
- Harassment, bullying, mobbing, or aggressive or abusive behavior during a meeting or conference organized or funded by the Foundation, in-person or online.
- Sustained or repeated disruption of a real-time meeting, either in-person or online.
- Bringing a dangerous weapon of any type to an in-person event at any time, concealed or visibly carried, unless the carrier is a registered member of law enforcement in the jurisdiction of the event venue.
- On an email or other electronic forum or list operated or funded by the Foundation, any direction of harassment or abuse at another member of the forum, including via a third-party (e.g. “I wish someone would
$non_physical_abuse...”). - Unwelcome sexual advances or physical contact with any other person or their possessions, at any in-person event organized or funded by the Foundation. This SHALL NOT include accidental contact such as being jostled in a crowd.
- Using slides with sexual imagery in a presentation, in-person or online.
- Deliberate misgendering or use of 'dead,' rejected, or known-obsolete names or nicknames of any person.
- Harassment of a conference organizer in the course of their work for the conference, before, during, or after the conference.
- Committing or threatening physical violence or expressing the desire of physical violence by a third party on another person, at any time, in any place, toward any person inside or outside the community. This is an example of an extremely egregious behavior that is subject to the strongest possible sanctions.
The Board recognizes that maintaining a positive and respectful community has been a challenge for some members over the past 30 years. To foster a positive environment for all participants, we want to clearly communicate our expectations of behavior for all activities presented or sponsored by The Perl and Raku Foundation. We kindly ask everyone to uphold these standards. If any member’s behavior consistently or severely deviates from these expectations, it can result in a response that could impact their participation in community activities under our influence. Our goal is to ensure a welcoming and respectful space for everyone, free from bullying, harassment, or abuse.
Abuse, taken generally, is the improper usage or treatment of a person or thing. It may take many forms, including physical or verbal maltreatment, injury, assault, violation, rape, unjust practices, personal or property crimes, or other types of aggression. By intent, we give the broadest-possible definition of abuse here; it SHALL NOT include simple discourtesy, but MAY include repeated, aggressive, deliberate discourtesy. Harassment and bullying (q.v.) are two of many forms of abuse.
Bullying is the use of force, coercion, hurtful teasing or threat, to abuse, aggressively dominate or intimidate. It is characterized by its repetitive nature, an imbalance of power, and its hostile intent. When done by more than one person in concert, it is called mobbing. It may include many different actions, done either verbally or via email or other electronic communications, including but not limited to:
- Derogatory name-calling and nicknaming
- Spreading rumors or lying about someone
- Threatening someone
- Yelling at or talking to someone in a rude or unkind tone of voice, especially without justifiable cause
- Mocking someone's voice or style of speaking
- Laughing at someone
- Making insults or otherwise making fun of someone
The Response Team SHALL make its official decisions by "full consensus," meaning, for all members not in recusal, 100% must agree affirmatively to the decision. In the event that full consensus may not be reached, a vote SHALL be cast on the decision in the email group, with individual votes recorded in the records of the decision.
For non-official or process matters, "general consensus" MAY be used, meaning, for all members not in recusal, 100% must agree affirmatively, or not object to the decision.
The Board wants all in-person events that the Foundation supports or produces to be free from dangerous weapons. Knowing that practically anything under the sun can (and has) been weaponized by someone at some time, defining "dangerous weapon" can be troublesome.
United States Federal law defines a "dangerous weapon" in 18 U.S. Code § 930, as "a weapon, device, instrument, material, or substance, animate or inanimate, that is used for, or is readily capable of, causing death or serious bodily injury, except that such term does not include a pocket knife with a blade of less than 2½ inches in length." The Board endorses this definition. Small pocket knives, scissors, or multi-tools are not a cause for concern, dangerous weapons are.
Harassment covers a wide range of offensive behavior. In general, it is defined as behavior that demeans, debases, humiliates, or intimidates a person, and it is characteristically identified by social and moral reasonableness. In the context of this document, it includes behavior that is genuinely and deliberately intended to demean, debase, humiliate, or intimidate someone else or a group of other people. It can take many forms, even some not targeted directly at a person who considers it harassment. Intent is not relevant; perception is. If a behavior is both deliberate and demeaning, debasing, humiliating, or intimidating to any person, then it SHALL be considered harassment.
The Board of the Foundation SHALL establish a Response Team for the purpose of investigating alleged incidents of violation of these Standards of Conduct, and recommending to the Board appropriate mitigations of any violations.
The Team SHOULD be of any size equal to or greater than three persons, as decided by the Board. At least one member SHALL also be a currently-serving member of the Board, who shall have all the same rights and duties as other members of the Response Team. If there is more than one member of the Board on the team, one SHALL be chosen among them, by them, to serve as the "Team's Board member" as described below.
There SHOULD be at least one member each who is primarily a part of the Perl and Raku subcommunities.
If the Team's current membership falls below three persons, the Team MUST NOT act on any incidents reported, either new or already in progress, until the membership has grown to three or more persons.
The list of current Team members SHALL be maintained by the Board, and SHOULD be publicly available. At in-person events (unless the Team member has recused themselves), the Response Team and Quick Response Team members SHOULD be given a ribbon, shirt, hat or cap, badge, or other visible icon identifying them as such, to assist in locating them in the event of urgent need.
The Board of the Foundation appoints members of the Team. If a person wishes to serve on the Team, they MAY nominate themselves, or they MAY be nominated by any other member of the Team or the Board. Upon Board approval of the nomination, the Team's Board member WILL discuss the duties and responsibilities of service on the Team, and if the nominee accepts, the nominee will then be considered a member of the Team.
The Board MAY, at its own motion and majority vote, dismiss a Team member from service at any time, for any reason.
A member of the team SHOULD normally serve a one-year term, with repeat terms at the acceptance of the Board. A member MAY resign at any time, with written notification REQUIRED to the Team's Board member or the Board as a whole.
One member of the team other than the Board member SHALL be selected by the team to be the primary point of communication between the Team and the Board for official communication bidirectionally. The Team's Board member WILL act as a secondary conduit for communication in the event the primary point of communication is unavailable or unresponsive for any reason, and MAY act as such in place of the primary point of contact, by their request.
The Team shall have no other officers.
There are four conditions under which a Team or Board member MUST recuse themselves from any discussion and consensus on any decision regarding a reported incident:
- Team Member is Reported: If a Team member or a Board member is reported as having violated these Standards, they MUST recuse themselves.
- Intimate Relationships: If a Team member or a Board member is or has ever been in an intimate relationship with the reporter, the alleged violator of these Standards, or the target of harassment or abuse, they MUST recuse themselves.
- Co-Employment If a Team member or a Board member is employed by the same company, or has been within the last twelve months, with the reporter, the alleged violator of these Standards, or the target of harassment or abuse, they MUST recuse themselves.
- Co-Contributor If a Team member or a Board member is a co-maint on any software package provided by CPAN or other software repository, or has been within the last twelve months, with the reporter, the alleged violator of these Standards, or the target of harassment or abuse, they MUST recuse themselves.
A member MAY recuse themselves for any reason their conscience requires.
Recusal will not change the number of members on the team; if there are only three, and one recuses themselves, action may continue. If, however, recusals lower the number of the active team members to one, the remaining Team member MUST immediately seek assistance from the Board in finding at least one other person to assist them in investigating the incident and formulating a response. That additional person or people MAY be a Board member.
The Response Team SHALL be given a venue on a Board-controlled chat service, logged and private to themselves, for socialization, discussion of current activity, and collaboration on development of responses. The Team MAY, by general consensus, invite Board members not currently on the Team to monitor or participate in their discussions on the service.
The Team SHALL also be given a private email list group, in which it WILL cast any moved votes on actions of the Team, in the event that full consensus is not reached in discussion.
The Team SHALL NOT have a public communications venue, nor use any public venue for discussion or dissemination of information.
Meetings of the Team are OPTIONAL. During any in-person event where two or more Team members are present, the members present MAY meet unofficially in person at any location, for any purpose. Official actions require half or more of all non-recused Team members be either present, or patched in via telephone, video conference, or other immediate communications method.
The members present at a meeting MUST communicate any actions to the remaining members via private discussion channel.
The Team MAY, by general consensus, invite Board members not currently on the Team to monitor or participate in any meetings.
A Quick Response Team (hereafter, a QRT) SHOULD be created for any in-person event being held or supported by the Foundation. The QRT WILL be composed of all non-recused Response Team members present at the event, and if the team composes less than three persons, it SHALL be augmented by the Board by additional persons to raise its number to at least three. These additional members MAY be Board members or other trusted individuals, and MAY include one or more persons from the event's organizing team.
If no member of the QRT is also a member of the event organizing team, the event's team is encouraged to send one member to be present on the QRT for advisory/liaison purposes.
One QRT member, who SHOULD also be a Response Team member, will be appointed by the members of the QRT as primary point of contact at their first meeting, if any. This QRT member will be primarily responsible for communicating the QRT's actions back to the Response Team promptly, both for archival purposes and in the case where further action may be required. This member will also chair any necessary meetings, and lead the investigation process.
A QRT is empowered to act during the published schedule of an event, for alleged violations of these Standards at the event by or against any event participant, organizer, volunteer, or venue staff. They may only decide sanctions that will last for the period of the event. If either the QRT or the Response Team feels that further sanctions are necessary, the Response Team WILL deliberate and impose them in the regular manner.
A QRT is dissolved after the event for which it is assembled is completed, and all outstanding actions have been reported to the Response Team.
All members of a QRT, and all Board members present at the event, SHALL be empowered to convene meetings of the QRT, for any purpose. If an alleged violation of these Standards is reported to any QRT or Board member, the QRT MUST meet as promptly as possible.
The QRT SHOULD operate similarly to the Response Team in the gathering of information and decision-making, and MUST follow the recusal rules and use full-consensus and voting methods available to them. Any actions taken by the QRT MUST be reported to the Response Team as soon as possible by the appointed member.
A QRT MAY, by general consensus, invite Board members not currently on the team to monitor or participate in any meetings.
- Reporting is private and confidential
- Investigation is mandatory and as confidential as possible
- Details of the investigation and alleged violation are "need-to-know" only
- Decisions are reserved at several places, to be made once information has been gathered and consensus reached, moving as quickly as possible through the process
- Ignore as much he-said-she-said-they-said as possible for the circumstance, and work from facts
- Give the alleged offender every possible opportunity to make things right
- ZERO public call-outs
There are exactly two ways to report a violation of the Standards of Conduct:
- Via email, to the Response Team
- In person, to a member of the Response Team, a QRT member, or a Board member, for violations at an in-person event only.
Any other attempted reporting method, including call-out to the Response Team or Board in an email list, forum, electronic chat service, or in a presentation or other real-time, public way, SHALL be ignored, and MAY itself be considered a breach of these Standards, including "publishing private information" or "harassment."
In no circumstance may an incident prior to the passing and publication of these Standards be reported or considered in the Response Team or QRT deliberations. QRTs may only handle incidents occurring at or directed at the event for which the team was created; other incidents MUST be forwarded to the Response Team.
Once a report has been properly submitted and is determined to be germane to the Response Team or QRT, the team SHALL make every prudent attempt to gather evidence, which may include transcripts of video chats or presentations, chat or forum logs, screenshots, emails, and/or reporter or witness accounts.
The responding team WILL take into account past archived incidents involving the alleged offender (since the passing and publication of these Standards only) and determine if it possible that the offense was inadvertant or a minor breach of etiquette, and that a warning and/or apology might suffice to remedy the breach.
A person who has a pattern of past violations MAY receive more-severe sanctions. If it does not seem possible to the team that the action was accidental or that an apology will remedy the breach, they will determine a tentative or immediate sanction by full consensus.
After the team has reached consensus, the Response Team's Board member (or for a QRT, the team's point of contact) SHALL contact the alleged offender privately, describing the complaint, evidence collected, and the tentative or immediate sanction. This contact SHALL NOT include the identity of the reporter or target of the alleged incident.
If, in the opinion of the responding team, the alleged offender can be warned about future behavior, or if they indicate that the offence was inadvertant, and they are willing to make amends, then upon delivery of that warning or apology, the incident SHALL be considered completed, and a report including all primary sources and a description of any contacts or discussions SHALL be submitted for archival by the Team's Board member.
If the responding team has determined a tentative sanction, the alleged offender will be given opportunity to present any mitigation of the alleged violation, and the responding team will take this into account before ratifying the sanction.
Extremely egregious offenses, including but not limited to crimes of violence at an in-person event that result in the summoning of law-enforcement, may be sanctioned immediately without defense, in order to protect attendees, their property, the venue, or the public at large.
Sanctions by a QRT take effect immediately, and are strictly limited to the duration of the in-person event for which the QRT was created. All other sanctions MUST be imposed by the Response Team's full consensus, and affirmed by majority vote of the Board.
After a Response Team sanction has been imposed and affirmed, the offender SHALL be notified via email or in writing. The target of the harassment or abuse SHOULD be notified as well, and the reporter, if other than the target, SHOULD be notified that the situation has been appropriately handled and the offender sanctioned. If the sanction includes removal or non-attendance from any subcommunity or event funded or provided by the Foundation, then moderators or organizers of that subcommunity or event will be notified via email of the duration and severity of the sanction. This notification SHALL NOT describe the details of the offense, name the reporter or target, or reveal any other private information about the offense.
Details of an incident MUST NOT be publicly published by any Team or Board member, under any circumstance.
If at any time an offender makes a public statement, either online or in-person, about the offense for which they have been sanctioned, the only acceptable response SHALL come from the Response Team Board member, and be substantially similar to the following: "Yes, you were given a sanction of details of sanction for your behavior."
If at any time a reporter, target, or third party makes a public statement online or in-person about an alleged offense, they SHOULD be warned that further public discussion of the incident is unwelcome, and MAY itself be a violation of these Standards, regarding harassment and/or the publication of private information.
This is a non-exhaustive list of potential sanctions that may be selected by the Team in response to an investigation. This list is in order of relative severity, but the Team MAY choose, cafeteria-style, one or more responses by full consensus to recommend to the Board for action:
- For some genuinely inadvertent offenses, discussion with the Team's Board member to educate the offender about proper behavior, and/or a verbal or written apology may suffice, if the offender is willing to accept that as a response.
- At in-person events, a verbal warning to the offender to stop problematic behavior may be given.
- An offender may be restricted from certain sessions or functions at an in-person event, including organizer, volunteer, or presenter, for a period of time, or permanently.
- An offender may be removed from one or more email lists, forums, or electronic messaging communities by its moderators for a period of time, or permanently.
- An offender may be ejected without refund from an in-person event, or not permitted to register and attend, for a period of time, or permanently.
- An offender may be restricted from direct participation in Foundation activities, including, in any combination, membership on the Board, participation as a grants manager, employee or contractor, grant recipient, or award recipient.
- If, in the opinion of the responding team, an offender may have committed a personal or property crime in the jurisdiction in which the offense occurred, the appropriate law-enforcement agency MAY be notified, and if notified, given all relevant investigation materials, providing full cooperation to law enforcement's investigation.
A QRT is slightly limited in its range of potential actions, to those that affect participation in the event in progress only. The QRT MAY, however, recommend further action to the Response Team to be taken after the event is over, in their after-action report. The Response Team MAY, at its own motion, add further sanctions to an offender that are within its purview, based on the after-action report from a QRT.
The Team's Board member SHALL have commit access to a repository private to the Board of the Foundation, and they SHALL preserve all primary source material of an investigation, emails, and discussion logs by committing them to the repository from time to time as they are completed, ensuring that all outstanding commits are pushed before they finish their term on the Team, or on the Board. At least one person on a QRT SHOULD have read access to this repository either directly or through a Board member, for the purpose of examining prior incidents.
Subcommunities not funded by the Foundation MAY choose to adopt these Standards of Conduct. This would include any online forum, chat, repository, group or email list dedicated to Perl, Raku, or both, or to a software product written in whole or in part using Perl and/or Raku. By adopting these Standards, the subcommunity gains the benefit of a dedicated Response Team (including QRTs for any in-person events it may hold), and agrees to participate in any sanctions that the Board may place on anyone in violation of these Standards.
Subcommunites SHOULD decide to adopt this document by their already-defined consensus methods, and then SHALL notify the Board and Team of their adoption. The subcommunity SHOULD publish their participation in these Standards with a prominent statement, such as:
This community subscribes to the Standards of Conduct of the Perl and Raku Foundation, available at GitHub. Complaints of violations of the Standards of Conduct must be directed via email to the Response Team.
This document uses phrases from or is inspired by many documents, including:
This Standards of Conduct document is licensed CC-BY-NC-SA 4.0 by The Perl And Raku Foundation.
You are free to use this License for any non-commercial purpose, remixing or revising it as necessary for your community circumstance, as long as you give credit to The Perl and Raku Foundation, and release your own document under the same or a newer version of the same license. If you would like assistance in revision, please contact The Perl and Raku Foundation.