What I never understand with discussions about COCs is that a lot of people seem to act as if COCs are to blame for how they are enforced, and that this is somehow a new thing. Before COCs were a thing, projects would still arbitrarily enforce rules, and not always the right way. This is nothing new.

I personally applaud the idea of a COC, much like software licenses. It's just a bummer that a lot of people out there in a leadership position don't know how to fairly enforce them. It also doesn't help that many COCs are poorly written, much like when an engineer without legal experience tries to write a license. Hopefully this will get better with time.