<p dir="ltr"><br>
On Apr 22, 2014 3:05 AM, "Christian Schaller" <<a href="mailto:cschalle@redhat.com">cschalle@redhat.com</a>> wrote:<br>
...<br>
><br>
> As a sidenote, there has been a lot of discussions on this an other Fedora lists<br>
> over the last few Months where people have loudly come out against what they see<br>
> as infringements on the Freedom part of the four F's. Having seen this thread I<br>
> am disappointed to see that nobody has come out in defense of the Friends part<br>
> of the four F's, because the language and tone used by some people on this thread<br>
> has been beyond pale, accusing the other participants in the thread of stupidity,<br>
> incompetence and general maliciousness. If this doesn't change maybe the time has come<br>
> for a board ticket to change that F from Friends to Flames?<br>
><br>
> Christian<br>
></p>
<p dir="ltr">A good point. There's a relative scarcity of discussion on the 'Friends' foundation.</p>
<p dir="ltr">In one sense, a relationship moves from acquaintance to friendship when familiarity crosses a threshold. You expect an acquaintance to follow social niceties, but you trust a friend to be honest even at the expense of politeness. Of course we still need a code of conduct, and occasional friendly reminders to cool down and take a walk for a while, but friends should mostly be able to look past choice of language to evaluate message and good intentions.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Equating disagreement with antipathy is more detrimental than vitriolic disagreement. We need the 'Friends' foundation to remind us that even in the hottest of flamewars, everyone has good intentions. Sometimes strong language is just a device for making a point. Even the wildest of idiom isn't inherently intended to convey personal disrespect. We need a reminder, especially with contentious issues, not to ignore valid points because they were delivered poorly and not to overvalue perspectives that were shared more politely.</p>
<p dir="ltr">--Pete</p>