[governance] Conflicts in Internet Governance

[Norbert Bollow]

[with IGC coordinator hat on]

Hello Rafik

Trying to respond to the puzzlement that you express...

both of the postings in the exchange that you refer to were not in
accordance with my *recommendation* to avoid ad hominem remarks. But
as I've tried to make clear before, that is just a recommendation and
it is not going to be enforced. I'm not going to react with a posting
every time that a recommendation is not followed.

In my view your characterization of one of the messages as being
*almost* (my emphasis) "bullying and accusation" is exactly accurate.
(In fact we have had uncomfortably many postings of that type recently,
from several different participants.) As long as the line to what
constitutes a personal attack is crossed only almost but not quite,
and the posting also does not violate the posting rules in other ways,
action to enforce the posting rules, such as sending a private or
public warning or one of the later steps of escalation, will not be
taken. 

The recommendation

  "Be liberal in what you accept, and conservative in what you send"

was meant quite generally, for everyone, with the intention to
discourage further complaints about specific postings violating the
recommendation to avoid ad hominem remarks and/or violating the posting
rules (as you point out, such complaints can very easily prevent
constructive discourse) -- it was not meant for you specifically, so if
it came across that way, I'd like to apologize to you for that. My
frustration about the recent phase of constructive conversation having
been so short (this hasn't come as a surprise to me, but it's
frustrating nonetheless) certainly should not be vented on you, that
was definitely none of your fault. I want to preserve my ability though
to *recommend* quite generally to avoid ad hominem remarks, without
that getting interpreted as an immediate godwin-type conversation
killer.

Greetings,
Norbert

P.S. Of course I'm not claiming that Jon Postel's sage advice on
robustly implementing the communication layers in TCP/IP was intended
to be used as advice on how to deal with ad hominem, but certainly many
good principles can be usefully applied well beyond the originally
intended domain of applicability. I am firmly convinced that it is a
good recommendation in contexts of cross-cultural communication also.


Rafik Dammak <rafik.dammak at gmail.com> wrote:

> Dear coordinator,
> 
> any key term used ad nauseam become de facto  a way to prevent any
> real "constructive discourse" and debate within the list, and is in
> fine a kind of godwin point (yes it is unfortunate).
> 
> I am not setting any norm or guidelines but replying to what I can
> see as almost a bullying and accusation to member of IGC from another
> (again it is unfortunate)
> 
> I am puzzled that someone was accused to do ad hominem  but you didn't
> intervene  in that case  abut you are only wearing your coordinator
> hat to reply to my message?I am honestly confused and not sure what
> to think about.
> 
> Thanks,
> 
> 
> Best,
> 
> 
> Rafik
> 
> Rafik Dammak
> @rafik
> "fight for the users"
> 
> 
> 2013/4/16 Norbert Bollow <nb at bollow.ch>
> 
> > [with IGC coordinator hat on]
> >
> > Rafik Dammak <rafik.dammak at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > > I am afraid to see your response in the borderline bullying and a
> > > real ad-hominem in this case. unfortunately this latin locution
> > > become the new godwin point of IGC list.
> >
> > Please don't attempt to turn a key term in a guideline for
> > constructive discourse into a word which which can't be used in
> > practice because it is would be considered a "godwin point".
> >
> > Without wanting to take away or diminish the recommendation that
> > I've given on avoiding ad hominem remarks, let me quote another
> > very good recommendation:
> >
> >   "Be liberal in what you accept, and conservative in what you send"
> >
> > (This particular wording may have originated in RFC 1122 [1], where
> > the principle is attributed to an earlier RFC edited by Jon Postel;
> > in that earlier RFC however the principle was worded differently.)
> > [1] http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc1122
> >
> > Greetings,
> > Norbert
> >


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