July 20th 2022 Transparency Report

#include ＜C++＞ is an unincorporated international group of volunteers, who conduct business through a discord server.

On July 20th 2022 a #include ＜C++＞ code of conduct complaint was raised against an admin. The subject of the complaint was a tweet posted on the admin’s personal Twitter account that was strongly disparaging toward two prominent C++ community members. The plaintiff arguments were that this tweet was against our mission of building a friendly community and that the tweet could be considered as libel which was a crime.

The recipient of the complaint spoke to the admins except for the target of the complaint. They decided to create a separate discord server and invite moderators from the #include ＜C++＞ server to discuss the complaint. Eleven moderators and admins joined the discussion, which commenced on July 21st.

The team decided that the tweet was not a violation of the #include ＜C++＞ code of conduct in the way that the reporter flagged (9 no)

The team decided that the tweet was not a violation of any other part of the code of conduct. (9 no)

The team decided that there should be no immediate adjustment to the code of conduct. There was no agreement whether there should be later adjustment. (1 yes, 4 no, 4 later)

There was strong agreement that the team issue a response to the person the report was against. (9 yes)

The team reported back to the reported individual to tell them about the complaint and inform them that it was not considered a breach of the CoC. In the same report, the team also gave feedback on the tweet, pointing out concerns some of the members of the team had, but without requiring any specific action from the reported individual. This was supported by 8 members, a two-thirds majority. The message was sent to the subject of the complaint at July 25th 2022, 19:14 UTC

During discussion, the group agreed to pin a new tweet to the #include twitter account:

“#​include ＜C++＞ is an international group of volunteers with plural and diverse opinions and backgrounds. It cannot be assumed that a personal tweet can represent our position: only tweets from this account do so. They are arrived at by building consensus, which can be very slow.”

It should be noted that none of the agreements reported here were unanimous: although there were no objections to some proposals, there were abstentions on every vote.

Also, there was no recorded process for handling CoC complaints. This will be addressed shortly. Historically, we have used channels with participation restricted to organisers, moderators and admins.