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@mehowte
Created March 4, 2015 13:16
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Why I'm speaking at Wroc_love.rb despite their lack of Code of Conduct
I'm a speaker at [Wroc_love.rb](http://www.wrocloverb.com/).
 
Personally I would prefer the place to be more inclusive But I won't
support bullying the organizers into making decisions against their will.
 
Making the conference (especially virtually non-profit one like
wroc_love.rb) is a huge amount of work And I know that because I've been
selecting diverse set of speakers for two Railsberry conferences before it
was even cool.
 
No, I don't want a cookie for that.
 
Wroc_love.rb have been doing great job so far at creating small focused
conference with interesting ideas, while they might have been neglecting the
diversity part.
 
They have a right to select the topics, speakers and themes they feel will
make the event great. Even if they wouldn't care about diversity (and even
if that's a silly idea) they have a right to do that.
 
Opposite to the infamous British Ruby Conf 2013, AFAIK wroc_love.rb team at
no point advertised the event as promoting diversity. For that reason I feel
they should not share similar fate. I feel that singling out sponsors and
attendees is unfair.
 
Like most of my friends I also cringed during one talk last year. The one
about booze giving you courage, among other weird things. The organisers
chose not to humiliate young misguided speaker publicly (his talk was
literally about how he was building up the courage for public speaches and
that he has a long way to go). AFAIK they did informed him in private
that he crossed the line and he is not welcome to share his views in
this way anymore.
 
Maybe they should have done more... Maybe I should have done more...
 
I feel that the speaker is the one who has to bear the weight of his/her
ideas and is the one who should apologise for the contents of the speech.
 
I will do that in a moment if I ever cross the line. But I'm not going to
force anyone to do the same thing. And I feel that considering circumstances
the organisers did the right thing.
 
Yes I'm aware of all privileges that come from a fact that I'm a white male
software developer. I feel safe at the conference, and I know that many of
you may not if they don't have Code of Conduct and enforce it.
 
I'm going to use that privilege to go there, share my opinions, give my
talk and try to make others question their own.
 
This is the constructive course of action I can contribute to the cause.
 
I will do my best to react to every aspect of inappropriate behaviour as if
the Code of Conduct was there, and I'm sure the organisers will do their
best as well.
 
If you are a sponsor, attendee or a speaker and you feel strongly about the
cause then fine, do what you feel is right.
 
But if you enjoyed the Wroc_love.rb but disagree with organisers, and the
idea of discouraging attendees, sponsors and speakers feels wrong to you, I
suggest you come to the conference and share your opinions there.
 
[Michal Taszycki](https://twitter.com/mehowte)
@rentalcustard
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lol fuck off

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