Re: A GNU “social contract”?

[Andreas Enge]

Hello,

On Wed, Nov 06, 2019 at 04:06:42PM -0500, Alfred M. Szmidt wrote:
>    The GNU Project wants to give everyone the opportunity of contributing to
>    its efforts on any of the many tasks that require work.  It welcomes all
>    contributors, regardless of their gender, ethnicity, sexual orientation,
>    level of experience, or any other personal characteristics.  It commits to
>    providing a harassment-free experience for all contributors.
> This is quite different than what we our guidelines say, it would be
> best to use that text instead:
>   The GNU Project encourages contributions from anyone who wishes to
>   advance the development of the GNU system, regardless of gender, race,
>   ethnic group, physical appearance, religion, cultural background, and
>   any other demographic characteristics, as well as personal political
>   views.

replying to your and also to Andreas R.'s posting with a similar content.
Indeed both versions are quite similar. I like the first sentence of the GSC
version, since it is a bit more general than "development of the GNU system",
so it includes all other tasks (webmastering, mailing list administration,
package submission evaluation and so on). And I like the additional last
sentence about a harassment-free environment. It is a bit more stringent
and less non-committal.

For the "regardless of" part, some of the nouns are the same, some appear
in one and not the other. I am wary about "personal political views", which
are not quite on the same level as the others, being a choice rather than
an inherent characteristic (actually, just like "level of experience"; maybe
this should be dropped). And it could be used in opposition to the others:
"Well, I am racist and homophobe, these are just my personal political views,
so I should be allowed to express them."

The "Contributor Covenant Code of Conduct" has:
"regardless of age, body size, visible or invisible disability, ethnicity,
sex characteristics, gender identity and expression, level of experience,
education, socio-economic status, nationality, personal appearance, race,
religion, or sexual identity and orientation".
Maybe a bit long for us?

The Libreplanet code of conduct speaks about
"discrimination on the basis of such things as gender, race, and sexuality"
Maybe too short? "such things" is also not a nice formulation.

What would people with more experience in this matter suggest?

Andreas