RFC: #ubuntu op misuse or not?

[Rohan Dhruva]

Hi ubuntu-irc,

I hang on out #ubuntu as "rohan", generally a lurker -- once in a while I
ask questions and answer things I know.

Today, I encountered something I found disturbing. There was a
misunderstanding between two users, and an op decided to silence one of
them. The discussion was civil (no swearing or flooding), but also
off-topic. I feel silencing a user in this case is overreaching and rude --
especially a user who might have been new to the IRC community (and maybe
new to Ubuntu itself).

On complaining about this in the channel, I was directed to to talk in
#ubuntu-ops, which I joined and then stopped talking on #ubuntu. On the
-ops channel (which is logged), I had a few heated words exchanged with the
op who originally took the wrong action (in my opinion). Eventually, it
boils down to whether words like "blitzkrieg" and "dictator" are offensive
or not.

Since the logs are public[1][2], I'll cut a long story short: the op chose
to ban me from #ubuntu for a week. This was without me talking in #ubuntu
or provoking drama in the main channel at all. The reason given was that I
was likely to misbehave in #ubuntu, without there having been any evidence
of having done so. As the logs will show, I tried to make my point in
various ways, sometimes being drawn out. In interest of list readers' time,
I can summarise the ensuing discussion as unfruitful and borderline hostile
-- in (large) part due to my own insistence of remaining in the channel. I
was unequivocally told to leave the channel at multiple times, with various
people suggesting I get a life, or my insistent complaining as pathetic.

I apologise for an already long email (but as people in the channel will
tell you, it's much shorter than reading the whole scrollback!).. but here
are the things I wanted to request members' views and comments on:

* Is it ok to stifle discussion by silencing one person when an argument
seems to be happening in the channel, under the pretext of avoiding drama?
** This is also against the guidelines of when to ban/kick a person --
there was no flooding, nor were there any swear words or unappealing
language.

* Is it ok for an op to ban someone in the main #ubuntu channel for
discussion happening in a completely separate channel?
** Especially when the discussion was exactly about the op overreaching:
this seems like an obvious conflict of interest. Also, should an op's
personal bias towards words like blitzkrieg and dictator be allowed to
affect a user's ability to enter a channel?

* What can be done to make #ubuntu-ops a more friendly place? The
discussion was very obviously hostile, and I was penalised for speaking up
against the very two ops I had a problem with, and in general the channel's
attitude was "write an email and gtfo, you're just repeating the same
things over and over". I don't understand the insistence to leave the
channel, nor the very obvious ganging up of the "ops vs. users" -- at least
I felt that way from the get-go. After I left the channel, the logs show
people suggesting each other to skip reading the scrollback and offer
sympathies for people who actually wanted to read it. If that can be
written off as humour, I would like to ask why the same kind of humour
leads to a ban in #ubuntu.
** This is especially important, because #ubuntu-ops is the first forum in
the appeals flow, and the experience there was extremely elitist and
hostile.

* Why is it so bad to suggest an op be penalised? Why does doing that
instantly evoke allegations of being childish and immature (as opposed to
people claiming they themselves are intelligent adults)? If an op can ban
someone for a week in a completely unrelated channel for discussion in
another channel, why is it sacrilege that there should be at least some
kind of disciplinary action?

* Continuing from the previous question, the general feeling I got is that
the accountability of ops in general is not up to the usual Ubuntu
standards. Whereas packages in the repo are vetted in several different
ways, there seems to be no similar vetting for the whole ops flow. People
claiming that "puppies don't die" if an op makes mistakes shows that the
general feeling of responsibility seems low. Another way of thinking about
this is if that puppies are not going to die anyway, why go out of your way
to ban someone for a joke here and there?

* Turning the tables onto myself, was I annoying? In short, yes. Could I
have done things differently? Yes. Feedback on my behaviour is as much
appreciated as the discussion on the above bullet points.

If you actually made it this far -- thank you! I am looking forward to
hearing other points of view, and as someone on IRC suggested, I will try
my best to ensure that this goes better than the discussion on IRC was :)


Cheers,
Rohan

[1]: http://irclogs.ubuntu.com/2014/05/15/%23ubuntu-ops.html
[2]: http://irclogs.ubuntu.com/2014/05/16/%23ubuntu-ops.html

-- 
Rohan Dhruva
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