Comment by dheera

"We will not use or promote any software artifacts that are maintained by Mr. Pretty"

This part seems over the top. You go down this road and you end up in some foss hell. Later you find out someone who abused someone checked in code in linux. You can't use windows or a mac because of jobs and gates and you are back on a c64 until you realize what a bad person Jack was and you end up on OS/2.

I guess those who signed want to use an unmaintained version?

I get that people want to do something. Maybe conferences are not the best avenue for the community to meet safely. Providing gender safe housing would go a long way to having a more successful conference if successful means less rapes.

>Which part of that is 'a bit like a public lynching'?

We further resolve that:

    We will not support the efforts of any party in the Scala community that provides a platform to Mr. Pretty. That includes, but is not limited to, boycotting events the party organizes and refusing to buy any product or service the party offers.
    We will not attend any conference or user group meeting organized or attended by Mr. Pretty.
    We will not attend any conference or user group meeting that does not have a code of conduct that is both specific (it must not allow predatory sexual advances in professional spaces) and actionable (it must provide a safe and accessible reporting mechanism for people who have been targeted).
    We will not use or promote any software artifacts that are maintained by Mr. Pretty.

I'd rather avoid believing anything within Scala community until its proven.

Look, both accounts read like naive women who accepted favors from a mentor-like figure and did not say "no" to advances. The other accuser starts her letter by admitting that she and Pretty were in an "on and off" long distance relationship. I think a significant component of the discomfort that these women feel is a manifestation of a sort of social indoctrination, wherein young women are led to believe that historically normal and mutually beneficial relationships are somehow dehumanizing because of a power dynamic. There is also an underestimation of the amount of clout and positive attention that accusers receive from communities for coming forward, and vicious, public condemnation of anyone who dares to question the stories or claimed harm to the alleged victims.

Humans are biologically predisposed to trade sexual access for favors. I believe the harm that many victims claim to have experienced is mostly or purely a manifestation of social conditioning and sometimes clout chasing where claims are exaggerated or fabricated. Blindly believing alleged victims carries a significant risk of victimizing otherwise innocent people and we need to move back to some middle ground. Especially considering the biologically determined nature of human sexual interaction - which is never black and white and, frankly, has always been a game of overcoming reluctance. Hesitating and not saying NO cannot be treated the same way as overt rape without criminalizing desirable (for both men and women) sexual interaction. Yes, the chase is extremely important, for both sexes, and we see the same dynamics throughout the animal kingdom.

The similarity is that both are mob actions, done without legal charges or rules of evidence.

I'm not defending the guy specifically; I have no idea whether he's a guilty scumbag or a persecuted innocent. But even jerks deserve a certain amount of due process before punishment. Maybe she's the scumbag? I don't know, and neither do you.

That’s not what lynching is. Lynching is mob justice without a trial. The name came from Charles Lynch, who punished Loyalists during the American Revolution.

Not necessarily by a racist mob, just an angry mob[1].

[1]https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/lynch#English

>no, a lynching is a murder by a racist mob

no, a lynching is an extra-legal murder by a mob.

>this is a community realizing that John Pretty is a predator and deciding that they don't want a predator in a position of power

Not really, it seems like cancel culture, did you even read this letter?

not me or you are to judge this, we don't know the details, it may as well be that he is completely shit partner and not much more than that, which is not unlawful.

do you think after those posts his scala/programming/whatever he's doing career won't suffer? he's dead in many professional circles regardless if he's jail material or not.