Comment by mschuster91 | Hacker News Reader

Comment by mschuster91 | Hacker News Reader

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> That said, he doesn't seem to have done anything actually wrong here. It doesn't even seem to be alleged that he's done anything objectively wrong. If LF wants to disallow right wing trolls at its conferences, they need to put that into the code of conduct more explicitly than they did.

The LF CoC is quite explicit: "Harassment will not be tolerated in any form, including but not limited to harassment based on gender, gender identity and expression, sexual orientation, disability, physical appearance, body size, race, age, religion or any other status protected by laws in which the conference or program is being held."

Given Mr. Trump's political actions especially against members of the LGBT community, disabled people (e.g. him mocking a reporter) or women ("grab them by the pussy"), it is crystal clear that associating oneself with Mr. Trump by wearing a MAGA hat is at least accepting those values and actions, and that this is open harassment towards people affected by Mr. Trump's politics.

Additionally, two paragraphs from the CoC also are a justification of the removal:

> All event participants are expected to behave in accordance with professional standards, with both the Linux Foundation Code of Conduct as well as their respective employer’s policies governing appropriate workplace behavior, and applicable laws

While wearing a MAGA hat is not illegal in itself, it is a violation of any kind of professional conduct.

> If a participant engages in harassing behavior, the conference organizers may take any action they deem appropriate, ranging from issuance of a warning to the offending individual to expulsion from the conference with no refund

And exactly this was the consequence. The troll knew what was coming for him, and I don't shed a tear.

>While wearing a MAGA hat is not illegal in itself, it is a violation of any kind of professional conduct.

To reduce your argument a bit, in the name of inclusion and diversity we must ban anyone who wears a MAGA hat.

Something seems off with that...

> it is crystal clear that associating oneself with Mr. Trump by wearing a MAGA hat is at least accepting those values and actions, and that this is open harassment towards people affected by Mr. Trump's politics.

You used the world "the". Charles Manson also used it and liked it. Are you advocating for serial killers?

> While wearing a MAGA hat is not illegal in itself, it is a violation of any kind of professional conduct.

Wearing a MAGA hat is literally political speech protected by the first amendment. I don't like it either, but... you can't go there, not really.

I mean, yes, it's legal (because of the same first amendment) for the LF to enforce a de facto "No republicans" policy (which is effectively what you're asking for) at their conferences. But to argue that that was the intent behind the code of conduct policy is stretching reasonability way too far.

> Wearing a MAGA hat is literally political speech protected by the first amendment.

Sure, but (at least from my understanding of both US and German law) employers can demand that their employees not blast their individual political speech into the faces of their colleagues or customers.

> But to argue that that was the intent behind the code of conduct policy is stretching reasonability way too far.

The thing is it's almost exclusively Republicans and outright neo-Nazis who regularly and intentionally cross the lines between speech and harassment. Left-leaning people, from the odd "off to Gulag" meme and beaten up Spencer memes except, don't do this. It's not a fault of the CoC that today's Republican Party is a toxic white male supremacist hellhole.

> > Wearing a MAGA hat is literally political speech protected by the first amendment.

> Sure, but (at least from my understanding of both US and German law) employers can demand that their employees not blast their individual political speech into the faces of their colleagues or customers.

But this isn't "don't talk politics with colleagues or customers". This is "don't talk politics when off work, ever", which is a whole different ball game.

> > But to argue that that was the intent behind the code of conduct policy is stretching reasonability way too far.

> The thing is it's almost exclusively Republicans and outright neo-Nazis who regularly and intentionally cross the lines between speech and harassment. Left-leaning people, from the odd "off to Gulag" meme and beaten up Spencer memes except, don't do this. It's not a fault of the CoC that today's Republican Party is a toxic white male supremacist hellhole.

Um. Every "look at this deplatforming!" post I've seen on HN has been against someone insufficiently far left, being attacked by someone farther left - including this one. How is it that the Right is both so prevalent that their harassment campaigns are the vast majority of incidents, while also being so ineffective that all the major events we see here are the opposite?

If you paid attention to any of the stuff, you'd have known that the photo of Chuck wearing a MAGA is from 2017.

So now he's being kicked from a conference that has not happened yet, because he wore a hat 2 years ago?

> The thing is it's almost exclusively Republicans and outright neo-Nazis who regularly and intentionally cross the lines between speech and harassment.

Do you really believe that? You could watch videos for hours on YouTube with leftists screaming the most outrageous and ridiculous things. Then you have the endless fake incidents such as Jussie Smollett's tall tale in Chicago.

I don't know how you answer the question of who is doing it the most but the claim that members of the left aren't engaging in harassment is absurd.

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