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>Why NOT formalize rules to some extent?

Because, at least in the case of CoCs in open source, the sorts of people most vocally pushing to implement and enforce them are almost invariably of the sort most likely to use them as political weapons and enforce them lopsidedly.

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Exactly. 99% of the time, CoC gets ignored. The 1% of the time it is exercised, it's because some random person with a chip on their shoulder from Twitter is looking for blood.

"Boot this developer from your project because they made a remark on social media I was offended by."

The problem here, though, is inconsistent enforcement. Assuming this side of the story is correct, he didn't actually violate the CoC at all, and the committee he spoke to did.

The problem here is not the CoC, it's that the organisation doesn't enforce the CoC, violates it, and punishes people who didn't violate it. They might as well not have a CoC in that case.

His point, at least as I grok it, is that the coc can be perfect in wording, but due to the nature and incentives of its birth, he sees it as more a weapon that a rigorous and fair standard.

I think this is spot on... Seeing more of this everywhere

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