Subject: Re: bug#61325: 30.0.50; Jokes in GNUS manual

From: Ihor Radchenko <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 07 Mar 2023 13:48:17 +0000

Richard Stallman <[email-masked]> writes:

> I think that when I wrote the Kind Communication Guidelines, I was
> thinking about discussions (like this one).  It asks people to try to
> avoid offending anyone else in the discussion.  That is a limited set
> of people to be considerate of.

Good point. I agree that it is meaningless if we aim to cater every
possible potential reader of the manual.

> When the same points are applied to a book, which is published, there
> is a problem: anyone might read the book.  So it can be interpreted as
> saying that the author should make sure not to offend anyone
> whosoever.  That implies that every demand for censorship should be
> catered to.
>
> That is not a good outcome, and not what I intended.
>
> It looks like I will have to think more about this.

I am re-reading the GNU-provided information for maintainers on jokes
(https://www.gnu.org/prep/maintain/maintain.html#Humor) and I note the
following paragraph:

    There are people who frown on anything that is slightly risqué or
    controversial, including jokes. It would be a terrible shame for
    that attitude to prevail, so our policy is that the occasional
    risqué joke is ok. GNU is a 21st century project, not a 19th.

AFAIU, this implies that even occasional jokes about controversial or
culturally-sensitive topics, like sex should be OK to have.

The problem with Gnus manual though is that the number of jokes in it is
huge. And it appears that jokes involving sensitive topics are not
occasional.

So far, the discussion on this thread revolved around all-or-nothing
approach with people often treating this bug report as either a demand
to remove all the jokes or a demand to remove all the sensitive jokes.
Originally, I was aiming to handle only the jokes I listed with an idea
in mind to apply the same approach for all other sensitive jokes.

>From my current understanding of the "14 Humor and GNU" section, it will
be incorrect to try removing every single "risky" joke. Though I do not
see why replacing the risky topics with more neutral would hurt,
given that the quality of a joke being changed does not degrade.

What is not clear for me is the word "occasional". How many jokes are
considered occasional? I think that it is something worth clarifying in
https://www.gnu.org/prep/maintain/maintain.html#Humor

-- 
Ihor Radchenko // yantar92,
Org mode contributor,
Learn more about Org mode at <https://orgmode.org/>.
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