Yesterday a tweet was sent out on @drupalcon that was unprofessional and not the right tone for our community or our conference. The tweet was one of many tweets that was scheduled weeks ago and slipped past an internal review process. The tweet was discovered within a short time, deleted, and replaced with something that was more appropriate.
We apologize that the tone of this tweet did not fit our conference.
The tweet in question was:
Want to reconnect with that attractive #Drupal designer/developer you saw at last year's #DrupalCon? http://ow.ly/63sxX
The author intended this as a quirky way for people to reconnect with each other but it came across as a singles/dating ad, an unfortunate twist of language. The folks at DrupalCon agree that it was not professional nor the tone that we want to set for the conference and it was retracted. A mistake was made. The tweet was replaced with:
Come to #DrupalCon and make some new friends and contacts! http://ow.ly/63sxX
I heard about the tweet at the end of day (approximately 6pm in New York). I tweeted that a mistweet had gone out and that the staff had handled it; they did and I'm proud that they reacted quickly and decisively.
Twitter aftermath
In this post I want to address and apologize for the tweet. I also want to respond to the Tweet's reaction and address a trend in the Drupal Community.
Reactionary behavior based on assumptions and jumping to conclusions and the consequences of that behavior.
Within a short time of the tweet going out several people directed pointed attacks at the folk(s) behind the tweet. Because of my position I took the brunt of these attacks, and I'm comfortable with that. Some demanded an immediate apology and another directly said that I was an embarrassment. This happened in 60 minutes or less and at a time when the London team was asleep and the entire staff was off for the day. Quick justice for the impatient.
DrupalCon is led by a group of paid employees that are supported by a strong team of volunteers from the Drupal Community. These volunteers dedicate hours of their personal time to produce an amazing event that is unparalleled. There is simply no other conference like DrupalCon. Part of what makes our conference great is the level of autonomy these volunteers have with the event, which ranges from session selection to online communication.
From time to time people are going to make mistakes. As a community we have to recognize that we are not perfect. There were many folks that recognized that the tweet was inappropriate and responded with constructive criticism. Thank you. You created positive change within your community.
However, a small but very vocal minority decided to escalate the "scandal" and asked for resignation of the person behind the tweet. This is simply not acceptable.
Burn Out
The consequence of behavior like this is that volunteers become gun-shy and quite simply don't want to take on the roles. I've seen this first hand watching the burn-out that happens at DrupalCon, sometimes because of incidents like this. Would you take on a volunteer role if you know that an online army is waiting to berate you for your mistakes?
This incident reminded me of Randy's Fay recent post. How Does the Drupal Community Burn People Out?.
I recommend taking the time to read his post and also attend his session at DrupalCon. I applaud Randy for taking this issue head on, this is an issue that we as a community have to recognize and work to resolve.
Whether you are on twitter or in the issue queue remember that you are talking to another person. Treat them with respect and help them to understand what it is they did wrong. As a community we have the power to treat each other right and to move our entire community forward. If you wouldn't do in person, don't do it online.
Let's have a great time at DrupalCon
DrupalCon London is only a week away and is set to be the largest European DrupalCon to date with over 1,800 attendees. The conference is going to be jam packed and promises to be an amazing time. The Drupal community is one of the most respectful, warming, and inviting communities that I have had the privilege of working in. However, people do make mistakes (we did) and when it happens let's all remember that we're not perfect. Provide constructive feedback and demonstrate positive direction.
Of course, as always our conference and our community does not tolerate any form of harrassment, violence, or offensive behavior. If you have not yet become familiar with the Drupal Code of Conduct please do so before attending the conference.
As a community we choose the direction of our conference and the tone of our community.
As a final note please take a minute to thank your organizing team
DrupalCon is produced by over 50 individuals that, in many cases, have dedicated hundreds of hours to produce this conference. When you are in London or online please take a minute to say thank you to these individuals that have toiled behind the scenes for nearly a year to produce what is going to be an absolutely amazing conference.
See you in London!
Comments
All this fuss about that? We
All this fuss about that? We are lucky Gilbert Gottfried is not Drupal volunteer!
What is the problem?
The impression left by this blog post is that the problem here is that an "unfortunate twist of language" turned an innocent promotional tweet into something that was "not professional" and had a bad "tone." This provoked a response that is actually now a trend in the Drupal community: "Reactionary behavior based on assumptions and jumping to conclusions."
Someone tweeted something inappropriate. It was unintentional. They were motivated by enthusiasm for Drupalcon. I believe this is what happened.
However, your post here misses the whole point. Some people read the tweet as a sexualization of the conference atmosphere. It's not an unreasonable assumption for people to make! O'Reilly had to issue a statement about sexual harassment at tech conferences just last month. Does sexual harassment only happen at O'Reilly's conferences? Is Drupal better than that?
Sadly not. Sexual harassment happens everywhere, and it has happened at Drupalcon. As a community, we must do our best to look out for each other. It's really terrible that volunteer conference organizers and you were the victims of "attacks," but I don't think you really understand what the complaints were about.
Come on!
There is nothing wrong with the tweet in question. I think that is just rather funny. People should not take a little joke like this so seriously. Come on people, it is a JOKE. You know, those sentences that make you laugh!
This is not sexual harassment whatsoever.
I remember seeing that tweet,
I remember seeing that tweet, smiling, and then carrying on with my day.
The discussion around this has blown out of proportion, which makes me upset. The tweet don't!
How to apologize and make amends
This apology went from a weak apology about tone to a worse, misguided attack on critics for their "simply not acceptable" behavior. I have to deal with conduct issues quite a bit at the nonprofit I help run. Here's what I would have written as an apology:
"We apologize for the tweet we sent out last night. [DETAILS of Tweet]. Whatever our intentions, this message was inappropriate and alienating. Sexual harassment and stereotyping are wrong, and are particularly harmful in collaborative environments like open source. We have asked the person who wrote the tweet to step away from their volunteer duties for the next month. We promise better editorial oversight of Drupal Association communications, and renew our commitment to Drupal's Code of Conduct."
I can't say we've had great models. Dries, when called out for an offensive slide in Copehagen, apologized without acknowledging the harm of his actions.
Finally, the apology says that "the consequence of behavior like this is that volunteers become gun-shy and quite simply don't want to take on the roles" as if that was a bad thing. Is it? If someone is inclined towards sexism or inappropriate behavior, whatever their other skills and talents, then they should be "gun-shy" and think twice before taking on responsibility.
Over-assuming
If someone is inclined towards sexism or inappropriate behavior, whatever their other skills and talents, then they should be "gun-shy" and think twice before taking on responsibility.
You're assuming that the tweet in question was the result of "an inclination toward sexism and inappropriate behavior". That's an awful lot to assume from less than 140 characters. That's exactly the sort of over-reaction that Jacob is talking about, I think.
To be clear, I am not part of the London organizing team, and I have no idea who wrote the tweet in question. However, I *do* get gun-shy from these sorts of fiascos. In fact, I actively avoid acknowledging the existence of sex or gender in Drupal whenever possible *precisely because* the community is so overly sensitive to the subject. (Not to mention biased about it. I have seen anti-male sexist comments at past DrupalCons go by without an outrage, without an uproar, without so much as a whiny tweet about it. The double-standard there is rather a problem too, no?)
Yes, over-reaction *does* make people gun-shy, and not just "those evil sexist pigs", and yes it is harmful to the community to assume that anyone who may possibly offend someone somewhere must be "inclined toward sexism and inappropriate behavior".
Was the original tweet in bad taste? Yes, unquestionably.
Could the handling of it have been better? Yes, unquestionably.
Is declaring someone as obviously an evil sexist pig and demanding that they be removed from an already over-taxed volunteer pool right when we need their help the most because they wrote a single poor-taste tweet an overreaction that is harmful to the community? Yes, unquestionably.
Actions are the bottom line
You're assuming that the tweet in question was the result of "an inclination toward sexism and inappropriate behavior"
I didn't make such an assumption, nor was I making any claims about the anonymous tweet author in the last paragraph. I was pointing out that if people become gun-shy about their engagement with a community because they are called out for sexist or offensive behavior, then I personally think that's healthy for the community, no matter how over-taxed the volunteer base may be.
As for the tweet, I'm not making any about assumptions about author at all. Are they sexist? Are they a jerk? Are they totally awesome? Who cares? What they wrote was sexist, inappropriate, and alienating. Those actions and only those actions are what this apology should have addressed.
Appropriate behavior
I was pointing out that if people become gun-shy about their engagement with a community because they are called out for sexist or offensive behavior, then I personally think that's healthy for the community...
If and only if such calling-out is legit and not excessive. If it is misplaced or excessive, then you turn off not only that person but all the others who are watching. In this case, I believe some of the responses were excessive.
Imagine if every time someone submitted a patch that had a security hole in it there was a shitstorm on Twitter, people called it dangerous and harmful to all of those sites that might end up running the code, and there were demands that the person apologize publicly and refrain from coding for a month. I can think of very few ways to destroy people's interest in contributing more effectively than that.
Ultimately, not about the reaction
Just like the intentions of the actors and assumptions about personal character, the reaction (whether you believe it was too much, too little, or just right) has very little to do with apologizing for the problematic tweet, and we're only talking about it because this post veered from being an apology to a recrimination of the community's reaction.
Your hypothetical poignantly shows how these sorts of social norms work: Someone contributing a patch with a security holes will (hopefully) get called on it. If they keep it up, they might be asked to go brush up on their PHP skillz. If they turn around and criticize their reviewers for calling them out, continue to make bad mistakes, or turn out to be intentionally malicious they will soon find themselves excluded or ignored by the community.
Usually, however, this process happens in front of a very small audience. This comment was made on the official Twitter account for an event that will be attended by thousands and watched by thousands more. That's 3+ orders of magnitudes larger than the biggest community project's core team. Given that scale, it seems DA leadership should have applied extra care and scrutiny to their Twitter posts and when writing their apology.
Strike "sexist"
After seeing a conversation between katbailey and bangpound, I should issue my own apology: I said, "What they wrote was sexist, inappropriate, and alienating." I was wrong. It wasn't sexist. In fact, it was completely neutral about gender.
There are people in our
NOTE: This was originally intended as a comment to crell's comment but I misclicked. Adjust as necessary.
There are people in our community who are hurt. This is not the first time. Are we really saying that anything is more important than that? If I call someone an asshole, and they say to you sincerely 'Hey that really hurt my feelings' is there ever an appropriate time for the response to be 'Learn to take a joke' or 'Hang on I'll get back to you' or 'Sorry that was a mis-statement on my part'? If such a reaction is given are we really blaming people for responding rashly?
It should be noted that the reactions didn't really get over the top until after the response was handled in a way the community perceived as unacceptable (this is a trend: see also Paris.) The fact that this is the THIRD EU DrupalCon in a row to encounter this has also, I think, led many in the community to believe that the employees and/or volunteers do not understand or take seriously their concerns, otherwise you would think that maybe something would be put in place to give more oversight to the marketing efforts. I fully acknowledge (and am now intimately familiar with) the differing attitudes towards sexual politics in Europe and the US, and I have a lot of sympathy for the people over here who struggle with understanding the North American attitudes. However, in the end, this is also irrelevant. The marketing team at Maxim has a much different mandate than the DrupalCon marketing team does. Marketing is about knowing your market and being appealing to them. Honestly I think that at this point removing all reference to sex or gender is an entirely appropriate response, because it is obvious that there is no understanding of our market's real issues, and its obvious that we are unable to address them and most importantly that is a better response than simply saying that we don't care if we offend people which is what you're saying when you so obviously don't put a plan in place. This is not about sexism or any of that, its about acknowledging that there is a segment of our community that is hurt by certain actions and saying "I would rather not hurt these people". Full stop.
"There are people in our
"There are people in our community who are hurt. This is not the first time. Are we really saying that anything is more important than that?"
Actually, yes: attempting to be fair and rational IS more important than that, because allowing anything based on emotions to trump all else can only ever lead to chaos.
I'll be the first to concede that it might be my cultural upbringing that makes me blind to the evil that was allegedly in the notorious tweet, but calling out sexism where there was none (it was completely gender-neutral) is definitely going to do more harm to our community than that tweet ever could, the way I see it anyway.
Amen
Exactly. Just because someone takes offense at an action does not, ipso facto, mean that the original actor did anything wrong. They *may* have, or the person taking offense could have totally misinterpreted something (in which case "I'm sorry if you were offended" is actually a perfectly fine response), or they could just be looking for something to be offended about, or any number of things.
Assuming "someone took offense" => "Someone did something wrong and has to apologize" as an absolute is damaging to nearly all human discourse. That way lies a lack of discourse.
We are not talking about
We are not talking about human discourse here, we are talking about the marketing channel for a multimillion dollar organization with several paid staff. There is a big difference. And its not like this was just one lone crazy, in which case I might feel more sympthy. It was a LOT of people. I personally was offended by the tweet, way more than past dust ups. I didn't find it sexist, I just found it super super creepy.
I also think it is often appropriate a discussion, SEPARATELY, about what happened and why and whether the reaction was overblown, but I'd like to think I can apologize and end it there and take that conversation elsewhere later, because when you follow an apology with 'but......' it really kind of makes it not work.
Sorry if I offended you! :P
BRAVO. This is exactly what
BRAVO. This is exactly what needs to be said. The original tweet implied no sexism. We are humans, we find people attractive. Fact. In no way did I read that as "Go stalk and harass attractive women." It was meant to be light hearted and funny.
I understand that it doesn't set the tone for the conference and I respect that. But for crying out loud. Everyone needs to calm down and relax. Since when did Drupalers get so hypersensitive and drop the S-word every time the idea of sexuality is accidentally mentioned. This is a classic case of uptight people creating a shit-storm out of nothing. #firstworldproblems
To whoever called for the resignation of whoever posted the tweet: Shame on you. Why don't you walk a mile in the organizers footsteps before you start making such ludicrous demands. I'm sure the organizers have a million other things to deal with.
Thus far...
I have stayed out of this publicly, however your post is a pretty good platform for my feelings.
First off, total disclosure, I was NOT offended by the tweet. Reading it, I too see (and have mentioned privately) that it mentions no gender, no specific type of relation, no anything except "attractiveness". That being said, I did then, and do now, feel as though it was completely unprofessional. And that, I think, is the rub for me. People were offended, that sucks for the person who tweeted it, BUT... when you do something unprofessional, you're likely to offend SOMEONE's sensibilities. There are a metric ton of other examples I can give within the community, HOWEVER those are not coming out of official drupalcon twitter accounts (or similar). And thus they pass the community by for the most part (or end up being very localized).
In my opinion, we could minimize this issue by simply being professional. However, it seems to be the opinion of many many others in the community that that is simply too much to expect. How sad.
Eclipse
You're right about sexism, but we need to define a safe space.
As I said above, I was wrong to say the Tweet was sexist, there was no sexism here.
I still stand by my assertion that it was inappropriate. A lot of other people seem to have been discontent and nobody, as far as I know, has stupidly mentioned sexism.
Clearly this gets under some people's skin, including mine. Heyrocker may be right about eliminating sex and gender in certain settings. "Official" communications -- including blog posts, tweets, et al. from official accounts, presentations held at the event, and event-related marketing should simply steer clear of sex and gender unless there's a very good, rational reason to talk about it (a presentation about community demographics or BoFs for any number of affinity and identity-based groups).
Look, when you get a group of people together, there will be all kinds of crazy dynamics -- romantic drama, interpersonal dynamics, racial fear and confusion, class friction, religious differences, generation gaps, language barriers, cultural chaos, you name it. People can and do say stupid, hurtful things. But you can insist that at least that within your walls and in your communications, the space/event/messages are safe for honest folks (which is to say just about everyone).
Because our space is dedicated to learning about recycling and refurbishing old computers, everyone has the right to ask that while in the space, other participants stick to those topics. Because we want to be welcoming, we don't talk about sex, gender, class, race, etc. in official communications. Why do it? You'll just piss someone off, alienate someone for no reason.
This philosophy has driven our code of conduct. We want people to have awesome, revealing conversations across cultures, because we believe a true diversity of viewpoints makes for strong communities and strong, successful projects (even if it is a wildly inefficient model). We aren't the thought police, nor do we try to be. Our policies, which are tested with every new drama, are not in place to ask people to be perfect, they're in place to ensure that our space remains as safe as possible for everyone.
A similar logic could apply to DrupalCon, Drupal Association, and other official Drupal events, which represent a more complicated community than FreeGeek ever will. I'd argue that a foundational concept for conduct at an event or conference should be that conversations and interactions are ultimately about Drupal, not anyone's personal life. Everyone should have the right and feel empowered to say "I'd like [your slides/this conversation/that tweet...] to stick to [drupal/jquery/views/the schedule + location...] and not talk about [hooking up/dirty photos/gossip/innuendo/sex/sexual analogies/race...]" and have those basic requests be respected.
I think we'd all be better off if presentations and official communications steered clear of certain issues. Based on the amount of conversations these controversies have generated, sex seems like one of the biggest and easiest gotchas to avoid.
I'm bummed katbailey thinks this conversation hurts our community. I believe that healthy communities have the arguments they need to with themselves, and while it's rough going, I think we've gotten better at talking about these issues (e.g. Merlin's really sharp post).
David, thanks for retracting
David, thanks for retracting the sexism accusation. If you re-read my comment you'll see that what I said was that false accusations can harm the community ("calling out sexism where there was none"), not this conversation as a whole, which I am finding quite eye-opening.
A lot of this I responded to
A lot of this I responded to Crell, but I wanted to say that I personally was offended by this from the moment I saw it which was before I read anyone else's comments about it. I found it super creepy and inappropriate. I actually don't think it was gender neutral (it was in text, but I think that when you say 'Look here for the attractive people' you are naturally playing to the male seeking female population but I also realized that is a really US way to read it.) I actually think this one was a lot worse than a lot of the previous dustups, and I'm a guy.
OK, now I'm definitely having
OK, now I'm definitely having a http://xkcd.com/386/ moment... but the tweet did not say anything remotely like 'Look here for the attractive people'. It used the word "reconnect" which unambiguously suggests that there's someone you've ALREADY met and were attracted to, whether it was for their looks or their great mind or whatever, and points to the attendee list as a means of ascertaining whether that individual will be attending DrupalCon London. There is simply nothing more to it than that for me.
What saddens me is that so many people automatically want to assume the worst of people, so that if ever there's a dogdy interpretation to be read into anything a person says, it will be, and that person immediately stands in need of redemption.
Assuming the worst.
I am very sympathetic to the person who made the tweet, because I can believe that the tweet was made innocently and from a place of enthusiasm. I can more readily believe this because I suspect (perhaps wrongly) most of the volunteers are probably on the younger side of the Drupal community's age range. It might be very distressing to experience this sort of public misinterpretation of one's sincere intent to crack a joke.
For me, the tweet's publication is a very forgivable mistake, and I hope there's always room in this community for people to make mistakes.
For there to be room for mistakes in this community, there needs to be room also for (productive) confrontation and learning from mistakes. People in leadership and authority roles need to be willing take responsibility for things they didn't personally do, and they need to pass on the lesson to others. Mr. Redding did the right thing by absorbing all this criticism, but given the seeming obliviousness to the actual problem and the clumsy handling of the initial criticism, I don't have confidence that the right lessons are learned here. Instead of taking responsibility, it's been deflected and blame has been put on the people who complained. And this is not acceptable.
EDIT: Just to be clear, the lesson is not "you're bad because you want to meet attractive people" but "the tweet was not appropriate for our conference." I think the O'Reilly statement explains the context, and Drupalcon organizers are duty-bound to understand this.
Sensitivity is a bitch, we need satire !
If any one is offended by my use of the word "bitch" in a subject .... wel you just have proven my point. I've been puzzled by this hyper sensitivity where people take things out of their context and start a crusade of "higher morality". For example I've been shocked about the reactions to Dries keynote in Copehangen when people accused Dries of sexism ... really ... how long do you need to know some one before it is clear what point they take?
Similarly, if you know me a bit, you know I'm a feminist and recently I found the most offensive jokes to support my feministic view. Brendon Burns and his show so I suppose this is offensive now has been one of the most liberating experience I've seen lately. Just listen to what he has to say about "higher morality" and feelings and appreciate how it turns it to humor.
I've actually got to this debate by Merlin's blog that has an update at the top: "My ability to remain rational is gone". This reminds me of Michael Welsh (29 min in this video) explaining the online medium: anonymity + physical distance + read ephemeral dialoge = hatred as public performance OR humanity without fear or anxiety. Just look at what happend to Croydon the past few days. One day social media is used for organized crimes, the next day it organizes community cleanup.
Thus my point is, we do not have an issue with sexism (or any other form of aggression) we need a proper social-contract to mediate the new medium. Fear and hatred are no match for humor, it makes us less of a victim and have more in control over the situation. Maybe it is time to create satire during Drupalcon?
It's about a sense of comfort and professionalism, not sexism
It should be remembered that nobody was saying last year that "Dries is sexist", but that "Dries let a sexist joke/comment slip out during his talk". The discussion that followed was I feel very productive, and I've actually noticed him going out of his way to make sure not to make any gender related comments in meetings, etc. It really makes a tiny slip up worthwhile and into an overall positive experience when the person who made the (albeit fairly small but still alienating mistake) acknowledges that they understand the impact and alter their behaviour accordingly.
The issue here was that this current small but still alienating mistake (which for the nth time was not about "sexism" but "sexualizing conference attendees" in an official communications channel, which has made many community members uncomfortable) would have passed much more quickly if that same level of understanding was shown. Because it wasn't we now have cause for a larger discussion, which has obviously brought up a lot of charged feelings about the appropriateness of sexuality in official communications, the conference, etc.
"This is simply not acceptable."
Excuse me? You think you can dictate to members of the Community what the "appropriate" response to an incident of this nature, is?
Mistakes are made, and I'm willing to grant this was simply a mistake. You would have done well to stop with the apology, before telling members of the community how to react and behave, which, indeed, is "inappropriate" to the situation, an "unprofessional" demand, and will be "simply not acceptable" to many.
Instead, you've dug yourself into a bigger hole. Scandal point taken, burnt-out volunteers point granted. You don't make unilateral demands and "speak for the Community" when you don't speak for the entire community; that's a political mistake of the first order.
I strongly suggest facing up to it and retracting-- keep the explanation, keep the appeal, drop the tone of ultimatum, which itself undermines your entire "understand others' perspectives" point.
You would also do well to, after posting this, reply to some of the people and concerns here-- as well as seek out particular members of the community who have posted on this issue, and discuss it with them. That you haven't, as far as I know, also speaks loudly, I'm afraid.
Best,