On Monday, 17 March 2014 at 19:29:10 UTC, Araq wrote:
>> The pervasive sexism in our profession is a serious problem, and should be addressed wherever it's found. If keeping sex jokes out of an otherwise-professional forum will encourage even one keen developer to stay a while longer in D space, then that's a tremendously small price to pay for an invaluable return.
>>
>
> Yeah but it can also discourage the many people who are fed up with political correctness. The "tremendously small price" might be much bigger than you think...

I cannot think of any case where restricting discussions of sex will restrict anyone's ability to write code in D or talk about the language's development.

I thank Walter for keeping these forums focused. It would be really hard to recommend D otherwise. There's no way I could recommend D to a class full of grad students if the primary forum for discussion were not family-friendly.

On Monday, 17 March 2014 at 19:29:10 UTC, Araq wrote:
>
> Yeah but it can also discourage the many people who are fed up with political correctness.

Good. If "not being a jerk" is such an onerous burden, their influence is almost certain to be harmful to the community in the long-term.

-Wyatt

On Monday, 17 March 2014 at 18:49:07 UTC, John Colvin wrote:

> As I mentioned in my post below, almost anything is offensive to someone, somewhere.
> You won't find a unified view of "Inappropriate" even among a very homogenous group of people, let alone an ad hoc group of collaborators and users spanning the entire globe, an age range of 60+ years and a wide variety of religious/cultural/political views and environments.

I don't see much room for controversy if discussions focus on D.

On Monday, 17 March 2014 at 20:14:25 UTC, bachmeier wrote:
> I cannot think of any case where restricting discussions of sex will restrict anyone's ability to write code in D or talk about the language's development.
>
> I thank Walter for keeping these forums focused. It would be really hard to recommend D otherwise. There's no way I could recommend D to a class full of grad students if the primary forum for discussion were not family-friendly.

I think it does though, the forum post which started this seemed to be on topic about D's publicity/marketing. Walter has voiced that he wishes not to have any sexual references in the threads.

As for "family-friendly." I take it you haven't been to D.learn. Swearing my be uncommon, but it does come out. This is similarly subjective since many families don't have much issue with their kids hearing/seeing swear words. While I don't have a family, I didn't see any issue with the offending thread.

On Monday, 17 March 2014 at 20:04:37 UTC, Walter Bright wrote:
> On 3/17/2014 11:49 AM, John Colvin wrote:
>> As I mentioned in my post below, almost anything is offensive to someone,
>> somewhere.
>> You won't find a unified view of "Inappropriate" even among a very homogenous
>> group of people, let alone an ad hoc group of collaborators and users spanning
>> the entire globe, an age range of 60+ years and a wide variety of
>> religious/cultural/political views and environments.
>
> Exercising good judgement and common sense is all I ask.

Of course, and I don't have a problem with this*. I was just pointing out that in today's global communities, people within said communities will have very different definitions of common sense / good judgement / appropriate etc....

*both in intention and understanding.

On Monday, 17 March 2014 at 18:18:34 UTC, Dicebot wrote:
> On Monday, 17 March 2014 at 18:09:29 UTC, Walter Bright wrote:
>> On 3/17/2014 3:45 AM, sclytrack wrote:
>>>    Seems like Walter wants it seriously
>>>    professional. No joking around about D.
>>
>> Jokes are fine. I post plenty myself. Jokes are fine in a professional work environment. Inappropriate jokes are not. This shouldn't be a mystery.
>
> Appropriateness of a joke is purely defined by a culture and is completely subjective. It is perfectly fine to define your own rules on your forum. Trying to appeal to some common morale as a basis for that is not.

Had a discussion with my Polish roomate recently about that. If we talked to people in the US just like we would have done in French or Polish, people would find it completely unacceptable. And Dutch are much worse (or better, depending how you see it).

This is cultural.

On Monday, 17 March 2014 at 20:04:37 UTC, Walter Bright wrote:
> Exercising good judgement and common sense is all I ask.

By my common sense and good judgement that thread was perfectly OK and I am honestly offended by the fact that someone does not consider my cultural preferences normal in that regard. However, I do understand that it was not your intention and take it easy, as should anyone feeling offended in the internet.

On Monday, 17 March 2014 at 20:15:52 UTC, Wyatt wrote:
> On Monday, 17 March 2014 at 19:29:10 UTC, Araq wrote:
>>
>> Yeah but it can also discourage the many people who are fed up with political correctness.
>
> Good. If "not being a jerk" is such an onerous burden, their influence is almost certain to be harmful to the community in the long-term.
>
> -Wyatt

Ah so "being fed up with politicial correctness" is now the same as "being a jerk". Very well.

On 3/17/14, 11:49 AM, John Colvin wrote:
> On Monday, 17 March 2014 at 18:18:34 UTC, Dicebot wrote:
>> On Monday, 17 March 2014 at 18:09:29 UTC, Walter Bright wrote:
>>> On 3/17/2014 3:45 AM, sclytrack wrote:
>>>>    Seems like Walter wants it seriously
>>>>    professional. No joking around about D.
>>>
>>> Jokes are fine. I post plenty myself. Jokes are fine in a
>>> professional work environment. Inappropriate jokes are not. This
>>> shouldn't be a mystery.
>>
>> Appropriateness of a joke is purely defined by a culture and is
>> completely subjective. It is perfectly fine to define your own rules
>> on your forum. Trying to appeal to some common morale as a basis for
>> that is not.
>
> +1
>
> As I mentioned in my post below, almost anything is offensive to
> someone, somewhere.

Heh, case in point - there was a gentleman going by "Ramon" at a point in this forum who flew off the handle taking offense at something I said (no idea what exactly that was).

> You won't find a unified view of "Inappropriate" even among a very
> homogenous group of people, let alone an ad hoc group of collaborators
> and users spanning the entire globe, an age range of 60+ years and a
> wide variety of religious/cultural/political views and environments.

One can argue that it's all relative but that's rather ineffective. The reality is I do work at Facebook with people from all over the globe and though cultural adaptation is on rare occasions an issue, it's never been considered inapproachable or even difficult.

That said, I don't think it's time to establish community guidelines etc. although at some point larger participation might create a need.


Andrei

On Monday, 17 March 2014 at 21:01:24 UTC, Andrei Alexandrescu wrote:
> One can argue that it's all relative but that's rather ineffective. The reality is I do work at Facebook with people from all over the globe and though cultural adaptation is on rare occasions an issue, it's never been considered inapproachable or even difficult.

So basically everybody adapts to american broadcast standards?

A fun book: The Hidden Dimension by Edward T. Hall