Oh for fuck's sake.

[rmd]

I'd always meant to get around to finally making it to a Readercon. But fuck that noise unless the board seriously unfucks this situation

ETA: I've never been higher in a con hierarchy than regular staff, but I'm wondering if it might be useful or at least amusing to try and organize a feminist-friend con scheduled against Readercon next year.

Comments

[lioritgioret.livejournal.com]

Hello, I have a stupid semantic question. Sorry to bother you but I want to be able to follow this intelligently.
Is "zero tolerance" always identical with "permanent suspension of membership"? (I recognize that both phrases appear in the ReaderCon policy that pertained at the time of the incident this year, so they're both in play here.) But is "zero tolerance" generally mandatory "sentencing," or is it just mandatory "arrest"? Because I actually don't think "zero tolerance" is a bad policy -- if there is harassment, something should be done about it, first time, every time.

So, anyway -- is "zero tolerance" generally taken to mean "permanent expulsion"?
Thanks.

[rmd.livejournal.com]

It varies. I think in general it's "something should be done" but can optionally be "something should be done and that thing should be banishment", but in this case, it was a "one strike and you're out"

[tb]

My take on it is that "zero tolerance" has indeed become shorthand for mandatory "one strike and you're out" policies. I'd prefer it to mean what it says, as I personally have zero tolerance for harassment or for selective rule-enforcement based on cronyism.

Another point that seems to be confusing people is that banning someone from a con is not be about punishing the offender but about preserving the convention (just like the calls for the BoD to resign). The criminal justice arrest-sentencing model really falls short here. (Not picking on you for using it, more trying to call out pervasive context I think is inaccurate.)

[lioritgioret.livejournal.com]

Thank you for both clarifications.
If banning the offender is about preserving the (safety of) the convention, it really does call for stepping away from the criminal justice analogy and looking at it more from a community-of-purpose perspective.
Thanks again.

[tb]

You're welcome. And I recognize that my phrasing about "preserving the convention" is awkward, but I haven't quite figured out how to express what I mean. It's not just about safety (a word/concept I have my own difficulties with). It's more about the con as an abstract that includes individual members, their interactions, and the environment. Community-of-purpose is good.