[python-committers] Identify roles of the BDFL

[Brett Cannon]

On Fri, Jul 13, 2018, 17:11 Carol Willing, <willingc at gmail.com> wrote:

> On Jul 13, 2018, at 11:39 AM, Brett Cannon <brett at python.org> wrote:
>
> On Fri, 13 Jul 2018 at 03:44 Victor Stinner <vstinner at redhat.com> wrote:
>
>> Hi,
>>
>> 2018-07-12 19:12 GMT+02:00 Mariatta Wijaya <mariatta.wijaya at gmail.com>:
>>
>>
>> * Diversity. Last years, the BDFL was a strong player to enhance the
>> diversity of core developers and contributors by mentoring directly
>> Mariatta Wijaya, and suggesting regularly to mentor more people from
>> minorities whenever possible. He also likes to wear PyLadies t-shirt
>> and support DjangoGirls ;-)
>>
>
> I lump this into the community and PR bucket as I don't know if we need to
> be worrying about appointing a head of diversity right now as that doesn't
> tie into governance. If, once this is all over, we want to take our
> diversity efforts to another level then a diversity SIG could be formed,
> but I don't see this as a BDFL thing and more of a team thing that someone
> choose to spearhead.
>
>
> Brett,
>
> I'm wondering if prematurely placing this in the community and PR bucket
> gives mentoring and inclusion among the core developer enviroment enough
> strategic importance. Knowing how gracious you are, I suspect that you
> personally are viewing it as such. Yet, I'm not sure that by removing this
> as a role that Guido has played is best for the language or the developer
> community.
>
> If I look at the many important roles that Guido has played, I personally
> believe that he has been someone who encouraged many women (and I'm sure
> others as well) and most importantly provided a safe place to share ideas.
> If we reflect on Mariatta's PyCon talk and Summit talk, it's clear that we
> should not overlook this role as growth and improvements still need to
> happen here.
>
> I believe that improving the overall communication and professionalism on
> mailing lists and PEPs is important to continuously improve the culture and
> discourse. While this may help improve inclusion (and is a step in the
> right direction), I would encourage everyone to reflect on Mariatta's talks
> and consider whether improvement will happen if members of
> GUIDO/elders/triumvirate/kittens of entropy and anarchy/pick your
> governance/etc. don't believe, embrace, and make this a priority  in
> stewarding the future of the Python language.
>
> tldr; We don't need a head of diversity. What we need is leadership that
> embraces inclusion and will steward the vision for improvements.
>

Yes, and I'm assuming no one would end up on any council who doesn't hold
these views. My poorly made point is I don't know if we want to lump all of
this together such that this council is expected to lead all of these
points explicitly. IOW if I were to make a PSF comparison this is like the
council being the board and they would be expected to support a diversity
SIG/WG.

-Brett


> Thanks,
> Carol
>
>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-committers/attachments/20180714/6e490312/attachment-0001.html>