Subject: IETF Diversity

From: Phillip Hallam-Baker <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 18 Jun 2013 12:52:27 -0400

I am rather disappointed that there hasn't been any followup to the
diversity discussion that took place at the plenary.

I do applications and I do security and so having a diverse range of input
is critical if the final product is going to be useful. There are no gender
or cultural issues in packet routing that I am aware of. But once we get to
the application layer they become central.

We seem to have interminable discussions about how to help some
hypothetical dissident in (pick your authoritarian state). But I can't
remember the last time we discussed Internet stalking which has been an
issue women have been complaining about since I started getting involved in
IETF. This is just one security issues that has a big gender bias and it is
a problem that I think can be usefully addressed in an open consensus
seeking organization.

It does not take 100 people to write a specification but it does take a
large number of people to adequately gather requirements. Taking
requirements from 100 people from almost the same background and
perspective is not very productive. I am aware that I have a limited
personal perspective which is why I actively seek out other perspectives.

At the plenary I pointed out that there have been women involved in IETF
ever since I started in IETF over 20 years ago now. Yet we have an IAB and
an IESG with only one female member who is not ex-officio (according to
their Web sites)

That situation should be something that has the IETF management worried but
I can't see much sign of that. The IETF is unlikely to die but it can lose
influence beyond the IP and DNS core. Sooner or later someone is going to
work out how to establish an applications standards process that is gender
and culture inclusive. And  we know from experience that in our environment
there can be a remarkably small time between the idea and establishing an
institution.

Minecraft was launched in 2011 and they had 4,500 people at their first
international conference that year, they are now about to have their third.
So they went from having nothing to having a larger participant community
than the IETF in a matter of months.

The IETF is a community known for valuing consensus rather than seeking
diverse views. I see a real risk that the consensus being built here is a
false consensus built by excluding opposing views rather than a real
consensus built on reconciling them. Bringing opposing views to this forum
is invariably a thankless task. The assumption is that if you can't hack it
here well that is your fault and your problem. Case in point,  each time I
get something wrong in RFC2HTML and I get the error message 'You Lose', my
natural response is 'why the heck am I bothering wasting my time here'.

I do not think that gender is the only diversity problem in IETF but it is
one that can be measured and the IETF is conspicuously failing. We also
have a rather severe age problem, twenty years ago EKR and myself were
among the youngest participants in most discussions and setting aside the
grad students the same is usually true today.

The perspective is going to need to change. Rather than looking for ways to
encourage a few token women to work their way up through the existing
selection regime we need to look at what sort of selection and
participation and representation structures will encourage diversity.

-- 
Website: http://hallambaker.com/

---

From: Peter Saint-Andre <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 18 Jun 2013 11:09:11 -0600

> diversity discussion that took place at the plenary.

Speak for yourself. Some of us are taking concrete actions (e.g.,
recruiting people for document shepherd and WG chair roles) instead of
pontificating at the mic.

Peter

-- 
Peter Saint-Andre
https://stpeter.im/

---

From: Jari Arkko <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 18 Jun 2013 20:17:57 +0300

Phillip,

For the record, there have been several ongoing efforts. First, there is a diversity design team. We expect some results from them before IETF-87, lets deal with those when they come. Second, the IAOC has looked hard at the possibilities for reaching further out in the geographical world - you must have seen the big discussion about South America a while ago. I expect some news from the IAOC on this front soon. Third, we have worked with ISOC and others to look at how we could expand outreach efforts, be it geography, new types of participants, or other factors. Fourth, I think many of us have had the topic in our minds in our daily work, e.g., when looking at competence profiles for tasks, etc. See Peter's mail.

All in all, I'd of course be happier if we had made a big change and impact immediately. But the reality is that these types of changes are hard and take some time. But there is definitely efforts on the way. Those will have effects, long term.

That being said, I don't think we've done enough. Do you have suggestions on what additional things we could do? (Or you, or others on the list?)

Jari

---

From: Abdussalam Baryun <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 18 Jun 2013 20:03:02 +0200

> diversity discussion that took place at the plenary.

I thought there are some people following/working this up, and made
some progress. However, I agree that I seen no progress
written/reported to us,

> the application layer they become central.

I agree that at that layer you will face the community.

> personal perspective which is why I actively seek out other perspectives.

I mentioned similar idea of that before, and I agree IETF needs
diversity to progress.

> I can't see much sign of that.

I suggested also that we need more women in management, so I support
that, however, majority men may not want that, so what can we do!!!!

> The IETF is unlikely to die but it can lose

It is good if IETF realise that it can loose, so it will work harder.
The IETF is mostly doing its meetings in North America so its culture
is closer to North America culture.

> than the IETF in a matter of months.

I think that is good news, and that IETF should realise how did that
happen, and realise what is wrong in IETF. I suggested before that
IETF encourages participants, and gave many responses but still I was
feeling ignored.

> consensus built on reconciling them.

I already mentioned that before, I found out that many say we want
consensus when they don't have good engineering reason, and when there
is no consensus they go back to technical reasons.

> Bringing opposing views to this forum

We waste time only if management don't listen to the
minorities/diversed of the community.

> grad students the same is usually true today.

I agree,

> participation and representation structures will encourage diversity.

I think it is very easy to encourage people, and very easy to
discourage people, the difficult part is to maintain people encouraged
and liking to continue participating in the IETF. Many people in life
hate CHANGE, so that is another difficulty, the IETF should get use to
CHANGE.

Thanks for your input it makes a greater impact than my inputs maybe
because my english.

AB

---

From: Phillip Hallam-Baker <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 18 Jun 2013 14:08:35 -0400

When I make a statement at the microphone and then have multiple people
come to thank me afterwards for making that point I don't consider it
pontificating.

I do however consider your own response to be an example of the type of
exclusionary behavior that I was talking about. Dismissing those concerns
as 'pontificating' does not help matters. And you have no idea what actions
I have taken to attempt to recruit people to get involved.

The issue was raised in the IETF plenary I would have expected mention of a
followup mailing list to be made here on the ietf discussion list.

---

From: Dave Crocker <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 18 Jun 2013 11:20:02 -0700

On 6/18/2013 10:17 AM, Jari Arkko wrote:
>     Second, the IAOC has
> looked hard at the possibilities for reaching further out in the
> geographical world

Jari,

The only action that's been cited has been holding a meeting in that 
region.  A number of us have posted comments suggesting that this is 
unlikely to be an effective recruiting technique; a few also offered 
thoughts of other approaches.  I won't rehash the rationales that have 
been offered.

If other avenues of recruiting are being explored by the IAOC, what are 
they?

If the only avenue being considered is a meeting in the region, it would 
be helpful to see some response to the concerns raised about this as a 
recruiting tool.

d/

-- 
Dave Crocker
Brandenburg InternetWorking
bbiw.net

---

From: Peter Saint-Andre <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 18 Jun 2013 12:42:12 -0600

On 6/18/13 12:08 PM, Phillip Hallam-Baker wrote:
> exclusionary behavior that I was talking about. Dismissing those
> concerns as 'pontificating' does not help matters. And you have no idea
> what actions I have taken to attempt to recruit people to get involved. 

No, I don't. I'm happy to hear that you're getting busy from the ground
up, instead of waiting for official action.

> The issue was raised in the IETF plenary I would have expected mention
> of a followup mailing list to be made here on the ietf discussion list. 

Fair enough.

Peter

-- 
Peter Saint-Andre
https://stpeter.im/

---

From: Stephen Farrell <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 18 Jun 2013 19:50:52 +0100

>> of a followup mailing list to be made here on the ietf discussion list. 

Not quite. My local [email-masked] folder has 392 messages that
match a search for "diversity" all but of few of which are since
this March, e.g. most recently before this thread [1].

There is a lot of noise on this list so I can understand that
threads might be missed but its not true to say there's been
nothing on here.

S.

[1] http://www.ietf.org/mail-archive/web/ietf/current/msg80076.html

---

From: Dave Crocker <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 18 Jun 2013 12:07:27 -0700

>> of a followup mailing list to be made here on the ietf discussion list.

I'm probably misunderstanding something basic here, because I thought 
there already was/is a list established:

    Diversity open mailing list

    https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/diversity

d/

---

From: Suresh Krishnan <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 18 Jun 2013 16:20:04 -0400

Hi Phil,

> of a followup mailing list to be made here on the ietf discussion list. 

Apologies. The announcement of the diversity list was sent to the IETF
announcement list and not the discussion list. The diversity list can be
found here as Dave C. mentioned.

Thanks
Suresh

---

From: Phillip Hallam-Baker <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 18 Jun 2013 18:23:36 -0400

I am getting my [email-masked] on my gmail account.

I have no filters that delete mail, no mails with 'ietf' in them in my spam
folder and no copies of 80% of the mails to this list.

---

From: David Morris <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 18 Jun 2013 15:50:24 -0700 (PDT)

> folder and no copies of 80% of the mails to this list.

That reads like you are missing 80% of the email distributed via this
list? That somehow, you are missing many emails w/o your filters
being responsible?

---

From: Arturo Servin <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 09:23:39 +0700

Dave,

    We created an IETF-TF in LACNOG; as you we also think that only a
meeting is not enough and along with ISOC, ccTLDs, LACNIC and other
organizations we are trying to encourage and prepare more people to
participate in the IETF by sending comments, reviewing documents and
writing RFCs. There are some specific actions that we are doing to
fulfill that goal (I can give more details if somebody is wanted to know).

    As Jari pointed out, the results are not immidiately but we are
working on that.

    If interested, anybody can subscribe at:

https://mail.lacnic.net/mailman/listinfo/ietf-lac

Regards,
as

On 6/19/13 1:20 AM, Dave Crocker wrote:
> If other avenues of recruiting are being explored by the IAOC, what
> are they?
>
> If the only avenue being considered is a meeting in the region, it
> would be helpful to see some response to the concerns raised about
> this as a recruiting tool.
>
>
> d/
>

---

From: Aaron Yi DING <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 09:13:26 +0300

On 18/06/13 21:08, Phillip Hallam-Baker wrote:
> When I make a statement at the microphone and then have multiple 
> people come to thank me afterwards for making that point I don't 
> consider it pontificating.
>

sorry, just point it out, sometimes you said it right, but that does not 
guarantee you are always right. to correct and make it clearer, "when 
... made a statement, ... people came to thank"  for past experience, no 
present tense please.

no further comment, since I actually appreciate what you said and the 
intention, as you described below.

-- Aaron

> I do however consider your own response to be an example of the type 
> of exclusionary behavior that I was talking about. Dismissing those 
> concerns as 'pontificating' does not help matters. And you have no 
> idea what actions I have taken to attempt to recruit people to get 
> involved.
>
> On Tue, Jun 18, 2013 at 1:09 PM, Peter Saint-Andre <[email-masked] 
> <mailto:[email-masked]>> wrote:
>

---

From: Phillip Hallam-Baker <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 07:44:56 -0400

On Wed, Jun 19, 2013 at 2:13 AM, Aaron Yi DING <[email-masked]> wrote:

> guarantee you are always right. to correct and make it clearer, "when ...
> made a statement, ... people came to thank"  for past experience, no
> present tense please.
>

It is hard to encourage, much easier to discourage. I thought Peter's
attempt at a slap down was completely out of line and demonstrates the
problem I am talking about here. Agenda denial is a strategy where to avoid
discussing the topic that you know you have a weak case you suggest a
change of topic.

There is a real problem with accountability and transparency in the IETF
constitution which was designed by a bunch of old boys to maintain control
in their own hands. Peter is a member of the IETF establishment so of
course he sees no structural problem.

What I suggested is that the status quo is going to lead to applications
area work moving to forums outside the IETF. The Jabber folk have already
done this with the XMPP foundation.

I have the greatest of respect for Vint Cerf's technical capabilities but
he consistently failed to establish open and transparent governance
mechanisms.

---

From: Dave Cridland <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 12:35:25 -0000

Phillip Hallam-Baker wrote:

There is a real problem with accountability and transparency in the
IETF constitution which was designed by a bunch of old boys to
maintain control in their own hands. Peter is a member of the IETF
establishment so of course he sees no structural problem.

PSA's been an AD, yes, but:

What I suggested is that the status quo is going to lead to
applications area work moving to forums outside the IETF. The Jabber
folk have already done this with the XMPP foundation.

He's also one of the Jabber folk, and indeed Executive Director of the
XSF.

So given these two statements are in conflict, there must be a problem
with them.

I think it's in the implication that the XMPP folk came and looked at
the IETF and decided there was some structural problem. I don't think
that's the case. You'd need to ask someone who was there when it
formed, like Peter, but I suspect it really mutated gradually from an
umbrella organization for open-source software projects, and by the
time anyone realised it was an SDO, then the IETF was already
committed to SIP/SIMPLE (to the point of giving them their own area),
and was in addition happy to cite XEPs and use the technology
operationally.

Dave.

Sent with [inky: <http://inky.com?kme=signature>]

---

From: Aaron Yi DING <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 15:44:54 +0300

On 19/06/13 14:44, Phillip Hallam-Baker wrote:
> On Wed, Jun 19, 2013 at 2:13 AM, Aaron Yi DING <[email-masked] 
> <mailto:[email-masked]>> wrote:
>
>     sorry, just point it out, sometimes you said it right, but that
>     does not guarantee you are always right. to correct and make it
>     clearer, "when ... made a statement, ... people came to thank" 
>     for past experience, no present tense please.
>
>     no further comment, since I actually appreciate what you said and
>     the intention, as you described below.
>
>
> problem I am talking about here. Agenda denial is a strategy where to 
> avoid discussing the topic that you know you have a weak case you 
> suggest a change of topic.
>

Definitely not hinting to change the topic..

As I just exchange opinions with other IETFer on this. With no 
disrespect, I agree with the latter part of your previous mail, 
especially about the tendency of being an exclusive environment.

It's not about correcting the grammar or sth other trivial thing. What I 
want to convey through the message is that our past experience may 
affect our judgment of upcoming deed. Believe or not, smart people like 
most IETFers, perhaps tend to be bit cocky as there are so many positive 
experience accumulated in the past. However, experience may not stand 
always perfectly correct, and it is not a justification for every future 
action. This is not targeting at you or any specific person.

There is visible problem here and perhaps more. Constructive suggestions 
and actions will be most welcome. Comments with pure emotional 
reflections are comments, e.g. not happy about this; those are 
completely wrong; it is hopeless...

I repeat that I appreciate your suggestions.

It would be nice if we all appreciate the time of the readers on the list.

Thanks,
Aaron

> I have the greatest of respect for Vint Cerf's technical capabilities 
> but he consistently failed to establish open and transparent 
> governance mechanisms.
>
>
> --

---

From: Dave Crocker <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 07:30:13 -0700

On 6/18/2013 7:23 PM, Arturo Servin wrote:
>      We created an IETF-TF in LACNOG;

Arturo,

Many thanks for the summary of efforts within the region; they sound 
quite promising.

Just to be clear, my question was specifically concerning the activity 
of the IAOC that Jari cited.

That effort has been started and pursued in isolation of any other 
efforts and it has been the subject of direct IETF discussion.  So I 
was/am asking about it's follow-up effort.

d/

---

From: Dave Crocker <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 07:32:01 -0700

On 6/19/2013 5:35 AM, Dave Cridland wrote:
> constitution which was designed by a bunch of old boys to maintain
> control in their own hands. Peter is a member of the IETF establishment
> so of course he sees no structural problem.

Forgive me, but you just responded to a rather unpleasant ad hominem.

We should not sustain such threads.

d/

---

From: Peter Saint-Andre <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 09:08:48 -0600

> We should not sustain such threads.

My point, poorly expressed though it was, is that it's not productive
for us all to wait from word on high before taking positive action.
Members of the IESG, IAB, IOAC, or any other "official" body are just
folks who are temporarily serving the community in a defined role. If we
want to change the culture of our community with respect to diversity,
it's better for us to work to encourage, nurture, and mentor particular
individuals.

My apologies for the extremely egregious manner in which I stated the
point. It was not directed personally at Mr. Hallam-Baker, but at all of
us who talk and don't take action -- myself very much included.

Peter

-- 
Peter Saint-Andre
https://stpeter.im/

---

From: Dave Crocker <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 08:15:21 -0700

>> We should not sustain such threads.
...
> us who talk and don't take action -- myself very much included.

oh dear.  /my/ apologies for being unclear.  I didn't mean that /your/ 
posting was an ad hominem, but that you were responding to one.

Your own point is fine and constructive.  Worthy thought.  Worth 
pursuing.  Offered independently it would have been dandy.

My point is that we need to stop tolerating ad hominem content and that 
starts by not responding to it.  Posting a reply -- even one that 
ignores the offensive content -- constitutes tolerance for the behavior.

The view that we should be resilient against such behavior is long past 
its time.  We should, instead, demand professional demeanor, and that 
means shunning behavior that attacks people and their motives.

d/

---

From: Peter Saint-Andre <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 09:16:29 -0600

>> so of course he sees no structural problem. 

Actually I see lots of structural problems -- I just happen to be of the
mindset that working from the bottom up is the only sustainable model
for change.

>> area work moving to forums outside the IETF. The Jabber folk have
>> already done this with the XMPP foundation.
>  
> He's also one of the Jabber folk, and indeed Executive Director of the XSF.
>  
> that's the case. You'd need to ask someone who was there when it formed,
> like Peter, but I suspect it really mutated gradually from an umbrella
> organization for open-source software projects, and by the time anyone
> realised it was an SDO, then the IETF was already committed to
> SIP/SIMPLE (to the point of giving them their own area), and was in
> addition happy to cite XEPs and use the technology operationally.

Well, the Jabberites were working in their own open-source community in
1999 and were quite clueless about IETF activities until the XMPP WG was
formed in 2002 (and, one might argue, even after that). We continued to
work on XMPP extensions at the XSF in parallel with working on the core
of XMPP at the IETF because I don't think it would have been productive
to define hundreds of XMPP extensions in the XMPP WG at the IETF (that
might have been perceived as a DoS attack, if you will).

But this is really not a diversity issue, so if we're going to continue
this thread I suggest that at the least we change the subject line.

Peter

-- 
Peter Saint-Andre
https://stpeter.im/

---

From: Abdussalam Baryun <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 16:16:42 +0100

Commenting is already an action taken, so we thank who made effort to bring
the points forward. I always add my comments even though I had given no
title. However, thoes folks that have been given titles by the IETF I think
they should do actions more regarding this diversity issue as
Mr.Hallam-baker requesting. I never give excuses to managers, but
appreciate all their efforts and patients for the community :-)

AB

---

From: Peter Saint-Andre <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 09:21:21 -0600

On 6/19/13 9:15 AM, Dave Crocker wrote:
>>>> IETF

Dave, you are completely correct and I'm going to make a commitment to
personal improvement. :-)

Peter

-- 
Peter Saint-Andre
https://stpeter.im/

---

From: Melinda Shore <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 07:22:51 -0800

> mindset that working from the bottom up is the only sustainable model

Don't know about that one.  In the US, at least, legal mandates
have typically led social change, at least when it comes to civil
rights, etc.

Melinda

---

From: Brian Haberman <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 11:26:13 -0400

> it's better for us to work to encourage, nurture, and mentor particular

To help facilitate the mentoring aspect, there will be a call soon for 
volunteers to act as mentors for newcomers (starting with IETF 87). 
Once the web page for the mentoring program with all the information is 
up, you should be seeing a call for mentors.

We hope that this type of program will aid in assisting newer members of 
the IETF community become more involved and productive in our activities.

Regards,
Brian

---

From: Peter Saint-Andre <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 09:26:18 -0600

> have typically led social change, at least when it comes to civil

That's a topic for the ietf-philosophy discussion list, methinks. :-)

Peter

-- 
Peter Saint-Andre
https://stpeter.im/

---

From: Melinda Shore <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 07:29:43 -0800

> That's a topic for the ietf-philosophy discussion list, methinks. :-)

To the extent that unexamined assertions about how social/cultural
change works are being used to explain why the organization doesn't
need to be particularly proactive, I don't think so.

Melinda

---

From: Peter Saint-Andre <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 09:31:35 -0600

On 6/19/13 9:26 AM, Brian Haberman wrote:
> volunteers to act as mentors for newcomers (starting with IETF 87). Once
> the web page for the mentoring program with all the information is up,
> you should be seeing a call for mentors.
> 

That's great!

However, why do we need to wait for a program? Can't we simply be human,
introduce ourselves to new participants, reach out to individual
contributors about becoming document shepherds, document editors, WG
secretaries, WG chairs, BoF chairs, etc.? That's what I've been doing,
and so far the results have been positive.

I'm not saying that's the only way to make progress, but I see it as
very much worth the effort.

Peter

-- 
Peter Saint-Andre
https://stpeter.im/

---

From: Phillip Hallam-Baker <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 11:33:58 -0400

> have typically led social change, at least when it comes to civil

When the IETF was being started Harvard had just abolished its quota on
hiring Jews and was attempting to correct their past discrimination by
awarding tenure to people like Larry Summers a year after they handed in
their dissertation.

That was not bottom up change. It was change that was forced from the top
down in response to bottom up pressure on the decision makers. It was not
Harvard that decided to reform, it was the government that told Harvard
that it would reform or see no more government grants. They still have the
'legacies' program in place that was originally adopted to keep Jews out of
a Protestant organization.

Academia is still one of the worst environments for discrimination. They
don't have formal barriers as in the past but the informal barriers are
steep.

---

From: Brian Haberman <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 11:36:12 -0400

> and so far the results have been positive.

I would highly encourage people taking that initiative and appreciate 
folks who do that of their own accord.

> very much worth the effort.

Absolutely agree.  The goal of this experimental mentoring program is to 
provide people who may not be sure *how* to be mentors a framework to 
work within.

Regards,
Brian

---

From: Abdussalam Baryun <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 16:40:15 +0100

I think all need mentoring. It is a both way learning for top and down
levels. So maybe newcomer can be mentoring to management of what is a
newcomer like these days :-)

AB

---

From: Hector Santos <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 11:41:37 -0400

It is one thing to follow this practice of, for lack of a better word, 
ignorance, for yourself but to advocate it as a whole for the rest of 
the community to follow is probably not the optimal path when addressing 
the "diversity" conflicts.  Everyone has a motive and interest in what 
they do, why they are here, etc. You will never be able to eliminate 
this nature element among people, especially among such a diverse group 
of disciplines, especially as the growth of electronic diversity 
continues.  I hate to see "Rough Consensus By Osmosis" being one of the 
recommendation outcomes from the Diversity Design Team.

Thank You

Sincerely,
Hector Santos, CTO
Santronics Software, Inc.

---

From: Peter Saint-Andre <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 09:56:21 -0600

On 6/19/13 9:29 AM, Melinda Shore wrote:
>>> Don't know about that one.  In the US, at least, legal
>>> mandates have typically led social change, at least when it
>>> comes to civil rights, etc.
> change works are being used to explain why the organization
> doesn't need to be particularly proactive, I don't think so.

Why do you believe that my opinions are unexamined? I have been
thinking and reading about social, cultural, and personal change for a
very long time.

Peter

- -- 
Peter Saint-Andre
https://stpeter.im/

---

From: Peter Saint-Andre <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 09:59:06 -0600

On 6/19/13 9:36 AM, Brian Haberman wrote:
>>>> My point, poorly expressed though it was, is that it's not
>>>> productive for us all to wait from word on high before taking
>>>> positive action. Members of the IESG, IAB, IOAC, or any other
>>>> "official" body are just folks who are temporarily serving
>>>> the community in a defined role. If we want to change the
>>>> culture of our community with respect to diversity, it's
>>>> better for us to work to encourage, nurture, and mentor
>>>> particular individuals.
>>> 
>>> To help facilitate the mentoring aspect, there will be a call
>>> soon for volunteers to act as mentors for newcomers (starting
>>> with IETF 87). Once the web page for the mentoring program with
>>> all the information is up, you should be seeing a call for
>>> mentors.
>>> 
>>> We hope that this type of program will aid in assisting newer
>>> members of the IETF community become more involved and
>>> productive in our activities.
>> 
>> That's great!
>> 
>> However, why do we need to wait for a program? Can't we simply be
>> human, introduce ourselves to new participants, reach out to
>> individual contributors about becoming document shepherds,
>> document editors, WG secretaries, WG chairs, BoF chairs, etc.?
>> That's what I've been doing, and so far the results have been
>> positive.
> 
> I would highly encourage people taking that initiative and
> appreciate folks who do that of their own accord.
> 
>> 
>> I'm not saying that's the only way to make progress, but I see it
>> as very much worth the effort.
> 
> Absolutely agree.  The goal of this experimental mentoring program
> is to provide people who may not be sure *how* to be mentors a
> framework to work within.

That sounds quite helpful! I'm not completely sure how to be a mentor,
either, I'm just doing the best I can given what I know so far...

Peter

- -- 
Peter Saint-Andre
https://stpeter.im/

---

From: Melinda Shore <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 08:00:31 -0800

> thinking and reading about social, cultural, and personal change for a

You made an assertion that's at least a little ahistorical, you
used it to support an argument against organizational change, and
when I disagreed you went to the "Let's not talk about it" place.

Melinda

---

From: "Moriarty, Kathleen" <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 12:11:00 -0400

A little earlier in the thread, ways to improve things came up.  I presented at an international conference in Bangkok this week on the subject area covered by MILE.  While the focus was intended to be more on how we can look at the problem space to make faster/more effective progress, standards will enable some of those activities.  The second half of the talk provided background on MILE, what we are trying to do and gave the audience a general challenge as well as had specific requests for help.  My last slide was on how to engage in the IETF.  Outreach and helping people understand how they can be effective within the IETF may be useful for other WGs as well and could help improve diversity.  I had 2 requests following the talk to give the same presentation at other conferences and will likely do them to assist in this area as well as to make faster progress (and hopefully drive people to think about how to share information more effectively.  There are many opportunities for people to help in this space.  

Best regards,
Kathleen
________________________________________
From: [email-masked] [[email-masked]] On Behalf Of Melinda Shore [[email-masked]]
Sent: Wednesday, June 19, 2013 12:00 PM
To: Peter Saint-Andre
Cc: [email-masked]
Subject: Re: IETF Diversity

Melinda

---

From: Peter Saint-Andre <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 10:12:35 -0600

On 6/19/13 10:00 AM, Melinda Shore wrote:
>> thinking and reading about social, cultural, and personal change
>> for a very long time.
> 
> You made an assertion that's at least a little ahistorical,

That depends on which historians you've been reading.

> you used it to support an argument against organizational change,

No, I didn't. Please re-read what I wrote.

> and when I disagreed you went to the "Let's not talk about it"
> place.

I simply don't think it's productive to have a long discussion on the
[email-masked] list about the philosophy of history.

Peter

- -- 
Peter Saint-Andre
https://stpeter.im/

---

From: Melinda Shore <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 08:25:24 -0800

> That depends on which historians you've been reading.

Peter, it's a fact in the US and Canada that court cases preceded
civil rights protections which preceded social change.  This has been
true for racial minorities, women, glbt folk, etc.  I expect that
there are historians who'd argue otherwise but allow me to suggest
that if so they are very, very far out of the mainstream.

It seems to me that without some sort of institutional change it's
likely that for a few cycles nomcoms will try to be "sensitive" to
the question of the underrepresentation of women and then it will
be back to business as usual, because that's the way these things
go.  It's unusual for people to voluntarily surrender their
privilege.

Melinda

---

From: Peter Saint-Andre <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 10:34:33 -0600

On 6/19/13 10:25 AM, Melinda Shore wrote:
>>>> Why do you believe that my opinions are unexamined? I have
>>>> been thinking and reading about social, cultural, and
>>>> personal change for a very long time.
>>> 
> civil rights protections which preceded social change.  This has
> been true for racial minorities, women, glbt folk, etc.  I expect
> that there are historians who'd argue otherwise but allow me to
> suggest that if so they are very, very far out of the mainstream.

I'm not a great believer in intellectual mainstreams.

> go.  It's unusual for people to voluntarily surrender their 

Thanks for giving me something to think about.

Peter

- -- 
Peter Saint-Andre
https://stpeter.im/

---

From: Ted Lemon <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 16:45:44 +0000

> have typically led social change, at least when it comes to civil

Yup.   First the Civil Rights act, then Selma...  ;)

---

From: Doug Barton <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 11:03:35 -0700

> Yup.   First the Civil Rights act, then Selma...  ;)

Yes, this rather succinctly makes the point that I was starting to think 
about how to write out much more verbosely. Without the grassroots 
movements pushing for attitudes to change the legislation never would 
have been passed. Melinda is correct that the legislation does affect 
attitudes after it comes into being, but it's a cycle, not a strict 
cause/effect chain.

Short version, if everyone does what they can to encourage diverse 
participation, we won't need "legislation" to fix the problem.

Doug (whatever that is)

---

From: Melinda Shore <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 10:11:42 -0800

> participation, we won't need "legislation" to fix the problem.

I'd like it if that were true but I don't think it is.  For example,
the majority of academic librarians are women (one demographic
survey I saw said 80%) but the majority of academic library directors
are men (again, ~80%).  I'd like to think that good intentions and
happy thoughts will provide a durable solution to the problem but
I'm not convinced.  I am convinced, however, that because of our
decision-making processes we would not be able to do "legislation,"
in any event.

Melinda

---

From: Doug Barton <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 11:16:50 -0700

On 06/19/2013 11:11 AM, Melinda Shore wrote:
> are men (again, ~80%).

It's not clear to me how this example relates to the IETF.

> I'd like to think that good intentions and
> I'm not convinced.

That's not at all what I was suggesting, and others in this thread (and 
elsewhere) have already outlined their actions in regards to reaching 
out to new participants, mentoring, etc. Personally I agree that those 
are the kinds of ACTIONS needed to address the diversity issue ... hence 
my suggestion that people DO what they can.

... and while we're on that topic, what are you doing to help?

---

From: Melinda Shore <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 10:31:27 -0800

> It's not clear to me how this example relates to the IETF.

Even in fields in which the overwhelming majority of
practitioners, the majority of people in leadership or
management positions are men.  Everybody's got good
intentions - I'd be very surprised if anybody is sitting
around consciously thinking that women are less capable
of doing a good job in management than men.  But you
end up with some disturbing trends in aggregate.  Meaning
well really is not enough, and as I said my expectation
is that we'll get a few cycles of trying to be more
balanced but we won't get institutional change that would
inhibit backsliding.

> ... and while we're on that topic, what are you doing to help?

That is truly an unfortunate line of argument, and I hope
you don't use it very often.

Melinda

---

From: Dave Crocker <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 11:35:08 -0700

On 6/19/2013 11:31 AM, Melinda Shore wrote:
> intentions

indeed, almost everyone claims that they are a better than average driver.

individual self-assessment tends to be a very unreliable mechanism upon 
which to base efforts at social change.

d/

---

From: Aaron Yi DING <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 21:40:43 +0300

On 19/06/13 18:33, Phillip Hallam-Baker wrote:
>
> Academia is still one of the worst environments for discrimination. 
> They don't have formal barriers as in the past but the informal 
> barriers are steep.
>

Relating to the statement above(I assume Phillip is addressing the US 
Academia), not quite sure are we still discussing the same topic?  
sorry, I am bit confused ..  since IETF is an international organization.

If yes, good to know more about it.

Aaron

> That's not at all what I was suggesting, and others in this thread 
> (and elsewhere) have already outlined their actions in regards to 
> reaching out to new participants, mentoring, etc. Personally I agree 
> that those are the kinds of ACTIONS needed to address the diversity 
> issue ... hence my suggestion that people DO what they can.
>

---

From: SM <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 12:07:39 -0700

Hi Aaron,
At 11:40 19-06-2013, Aaron Yi DING wrote:
>Relating to the statement above(I assume Phillip is addressing the 
>US Academia), not quite sure are we still discussing the same topic?

I changed the subject line as I am as confused as to whether the IETF 
is an international organization.

There was a mention of "First the Civil Rights act, then 
Selma...  ;)".  I assume that the act is an Act for the United States 
of America.  Harvard was also mentioned.  I did a quick search and I 
found out that "Harvard University is an American private Ivy League 
research university".

Regards,
-sm

---

From: Doug Barton <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 12:12:45 -0700

On 06/19/2013 11:40 AM, Aaron Yi DING wrote:
> Academia), not quite sure are we still discussing the same topic? sorry,
> I am bit confused ..  since IETF is an international organization.

We can point to all kinds of examples that are outside the IETF of where 
various biases exist. It's not at all clear that the existence of those 
problems elsewhere corresponds to any actual problem within our 
organization.

That is NOT to say that we don't have a problem, only that making 
conclusions based on unrelated data is bad science.

Doug

---

From: Peter Saint-Andre <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 13:14:20 -0600

> conclusions based on unrelated data is bad science.

On the other hand, every organization thinks it is special, and most
aren't. :-)

Peter

-- 
Peter Saint-Andre
https://stpeter.im/

---

From: Yoav Nir <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 19:18:35 +0000

On Jun 19, 2013, at 10:07 PM, SM <[email-masked]>
 wrote:

>> Relating to the statement above(I assume Phillip is addressing the US Academia), not quite sure are we still discussing the same topic?
> I changed the subject line as I am as confused as to whether the IETF is an international organization.
> 
> There was a mention of "First the Civil Rights act, then Selma...  ;)".  I assume that the act is an Act for the United States of America.  Harvard was also mentioned.  I did a quick search and I found out that "Harvard University is an American private Ivy League research university".

Yeah, and "act" is what Americans call statutes, and Selma is a city in Alabama where there was some controversy about voting rights. You sure need to know a lot of Americana to participate meaningfully in some of these discussions.

---

From: "Romascanu, Dan (Dan)" <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 19:19:55 +0000

Well, this is a cultural thing :-) Some of our American colleagues cannot avoid using examples related to the American constitution, history or academy, forgetting that out-of-the-US interlocutors may not that familiar with them. Luckily, they did not mention any baseball rule in this discussions (yet) :-) 

Regards,

Dan

> -----Original Message-----
> From: [email-masked] [mailto:[email-masked]] On Behalf Of
> SM
> Sent: Wednesday, June 19, 2013 10:08 PM
> To: Aaron Yi DING
> Cc: [email-masked]
> Subject: Is the IETF is an international organization? (was: IETF
> Diversity)
> 
> Hi Aaron,
> There was a mention of "First the Civil Rights act, then Selma...  ;)".
> I assume that the act is an Act for the United States of America.
> Harvard was also mentioned.  I did a quick search and I found out that
> "Harvard University is an American private Ivy League research
> university".
> 
> Regards,
> -sm

---

From: Yoav Nir <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 19:21:25 +0000

On Jun 19, 2013, at 10:12 PM, Doug Barton <[email-masked]>
 wrote:
> We can point to all kinds of examples that are outside the IETF of where various biases exist. It's not at all clear that the existence of those problems elsewhere corresponds to any actual problem within our organization.

Looking at how similar problems were solved in other places could help us figure out how to solve such problems in the IETF.

And Academia is much more similar to the IETF than is the state of Alabama.

Yoav

---

From: Doug Barton <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 12:27:50 -0700

> On the other hand, every organization thinks it is special, and most

I thought I made it clear that I'm not saying, "there is no problem." I 
am only saying that pointing to other, unrelated situations and saying 
"They seem to have a problem, so we must have a problem" is a waste of 
everyone's time.

The more interesting questions are whether or not the current makeup of 
the IETF leadership is reflective of the population (nee "membership") 
of the IETF as a whole; and whether or not the IETF population reflects 
the larger population of the tech community it draws from. Those are 
problems that outreach, mentorship, etc. can make concrete impacts on.

But until we understand what WE are dealing with (as opposed to what 
other organizations are dealing with) we're not going to make any actual 
progress.

Doug

---

From: Doug Barton <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 12:47:32 -0700

On 06/19/2013 11:31 AM, Melinda Shore wrote:
> management positions are men.

So again, it's not at all clear how that relates to the IETF (given that 
we don't fall into the category of "the overwhelming majority of 
practitioners [are women]."

To be clear, I'm not trying to be critical of your point, I'm simply 
asking you to compare apples to apples.

> Everybody's got good

Yes, you've made the point rather amply that you think there is an 
institutional problem with lack of women in leadership roles _in the 
IETF_. My experience has been considerably different however, and as a 
result I find it hard to accept your premise unconditionally. At this 
moment in time I think it's correct to say that women are 
underrepresented, but I don't think it's proven yet that this represents 
any kind of institutional bias.

I look at women like Leslie Daigle, Allison Mankin, Margaret Wasserman, 
Lynn St. Amour, Joyce Reynolds ... those are just off the top of my 
head; certainly not my intention to slight anyone ... all of whom have 
now, or have had significant leadership roles, and made lasting impacts 
on the IETF both in its work product and culture.

Can we (and should we) do better? Absolutely. I would love to see more 
participation by different groups, nationalities, genders, etc. And I 
have a vested interest here. I have a daughter who is smart as a whip, 
and when it comes time for her to find a job I want to be sure that 
every door is open to her.

But I also think it's possible for us to agree that we have room to 
improve without constantly banging the drum that we have a deep-seated 
institutional bias, especially when that point is far from proven.

> you don't use it very often.

It's not a "line of argument," it's a legitimate question. Others have 
described their actions to help improve the situation, which hopefully 
still others can latch onto and emulate. You bring a unique perspective 
to the table, so I'm hoping that you can describe what you're doing to 
help solve the problem so that others can emulate your example.

Doug

---

From: Peter Saint-Andre <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 13:47:52 -0600

> other organizations are dealing with) we're not going to make any actual

Very well said.

Peter

-- 
Peter Saint-Andre
https://stpeter.im/

---

From: Yoav Nir <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 19:56:32 +0000

On Jun 19, 2013, at 6:26 PM, Brian Haberman <[email-masked]> wrote:

> To help facilitate the mentoring aspect, there will be a call soon for volunteers to act as mentors for newcomers (starting with IETF 87). Once the web page for the mentoring program with all the information is up, you should be seeing a call for mentors.
> 
> We hope that this type of program will aid in assisting newer members of the IETF community become more involved and productive in our activities.

This may be helpful in getting first-time attendees to stay on with the IETF. That is a laudable goal in itself, but I'm not sure if it will help diversity. Just bringing in new white male employees of US router companies will not increase diversity. It might work if the pool of newcomers is considerably more diverse than the pool of veterans, but having been in the last two meet-and-greets, I see a lot of the same, except that the newcomer group has more people from China. I see few women, hardly any Africans (from Africa or the US), and not a lot of company names I recognize as operators.

So unless we find a way to get a more diverse group to the meetings, such a mentoring program will only help us get some new blood - same as the old blood, but new.

---

From: Doug Barton <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 13:08:12 -0700

> Looking at how similar problems were solved in other places could help us figure out how to solve such problems in the IETF.

Of course, but we have to be sure that the problems really are similar 
first.

> And Academia is much more similar to the IETF than is the state of Alabama.

Yeah, but so what? That's like saying that avocados and oranges are more 
similar than avocados and rocks. But if I want to make guacamole I 
better be able to differentiate the different kinds of fruit.

I'm not trying to be pedantic for its own sake here. It is genuinely 
important to understand the population you are working with if you're 
going to address social issues. Concepts (and more importantly 
solutions) that are relevant for one group may very well not be 
applicable to another group because the populations differ in subtle but 
important ways.

Doug

---

From: Aaron Yi DING <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 23:24:41 +0300

> So unless we find a way to get a more diverse group to the meetings, such a mentoring program will only help us get some new blood - same as the old blood, but new.

That sounds similar to "new bottles but still filled with the old type 
wine" - long lasting old Chinese saying :)

Personally speaking, mentoring is a viable one to start with, although 
some colleagues told me it has been here for quite a while.. Anyway, as 
we still got several unsolved questions, such as what Doug mentioned,  
"until we understand what WE are dealing with (as opposed to what other 
organizations are dealing with) we're not going to make any actual 
progress.", unless our community come up with better ones soon 
addressing those, diversity won't make to IETF in a couple months.

Thanks for Brian and folks taking their time to setup the whole thing.

---

From: Ted Lemon <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 20:40:47 +0000

> Yeah, and "act" is what Americans call statutes, and Selma is a city in Alabama where there was some controversy about voting rights. You sure need to know a lot of Americana to participate meaning…

Sorry.   That was directed largely at Melinda who is, to the best of my understanding, an American.   The point was that in fact the civil rights movement started with individuals, not the government.

---

From: Melinda Shore <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 12:52:10 -0800

On 6/19/13 12:40 PM, Ted Lemon wrote:
> Sorry.   That was directed largely at Melinda who is, to the best of
> my understanding, an American.  

Binational.  Thanks for asking.

Melinda

---

From: Douglas Otis <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 14:18:33 -0700

> There was a mention of "First the Civil Rights act, then Selma...  ;)".  I assume that the act is an Act for the United States of America.  Harvard was also mentioned.  I did a quick search and I f…

Dear SM,

Are new ideas embraced without any prior geographic endorsement? While this seems to be the case, organizations with greater resources, often from various regions, will steer development.  

There be dragons empathizing about motivations to understand declared rules, stated justifications, or even what censuses really means.  Even with the best of intentions, it is very difficult to have meaningful discussions about motivations . 

In respect to privacy, organizations both sell and purchase profile information containing individual preferences and contact information.  There are also organizations that attempt offer selective relationships, often via a social network.  In deciding what is important to protect, the identity of those initiating transactions, or those receiving them are at odds. 

Even a statement females are more sensitive about security than men in respect to technology in the home can be viewed as either a real insight or a sexist view.  By having gender diversity, questioning the underlying motivations can be avoided.  It seems the same can be said of those trading profiles or and those offering protection from profilers.  Motivation plays a critical role in steering development.  It is just not something easily discussed within an international organization.

Regards,
Douglas Otis

---

From: Warren Kumari <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 17:19:30 -0400

> indeed, almost everyone claims that they are a better than average driver.

Nah, I'm better than everyone else, because I don't suffer from the Dunning–Kruger effect.

> 
> individual self-assessment tends to be a very unreliable mechanism upon which to base efforts at social change.

Indeed.

W

-- 
Never criticize a man till you've walked a mile in his shoes.  Then if he didn't like what you've said, he's a mile away and barefoot.

---

From: Aaron Yi DING <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 20 Jun 2013 01:57:50 +0300

> This may be helpful in getting first-time attendees to stay on with the IETF. That is a laudable goal in itself, but I'm not sure if it will help diversity. Just bringing in new white male employee…

There is one observation puzzled me, and it will be good to hear from 
the community, sort of like 'request for comments'.  Part of it is based 
on the previous IETF panel discussions plus all sorts of mails from ietf 
related lists.

By following our diversity discussions so far, the term "white male" 
seems to be cited rather frequently and most of time with some kind of 
emotions attached to it, e.g. dominant, power, monopoly etc.  To be 
honest, I do have a mixed feeling when encountering such KEY WORD in a 
public speech or along the lines of mail. That feeling resembles very 
much when I heard Chinese being associated with minority, passive, 
reserved or even, communist ...

I understand the term "black" is not friendly to mention in US, but 
seriously, is the other term WHITE now being so freely used as such, 
especially in IETF, not even a slight concern? Just because the 
tolerance level among the white male group is already so high that no 
one really cares about it anymore? or just because currently IETF 
engineers tagged with white male background are found in most 
management/leadership slots so that it is easier to draw some kind of 
hatred feeling or recognition from the under-present group who have 
being pressed for so long? Sometimes it is quite hard to distinguish the 
intention of such, being considerate and thoughtful for the healthy 
development of our community, or just to fit in certain group's craving 
for the taste of the throne (here I don't target at any specific person, 
seriously)

One visible flaw is that to wire the "white male" up against diversity 
in IETF is largely irrelevant to the topic itself. This is in large a 
stereotype. Like currently there are so many Chinese living 
permanently/grow up in America, Europe and Asia. The "white male" are 
similarly not just from or living/working in the US, there are so many I 
know actually are living outside, oh well, definitely covering EU, and 
in many Asian areas, Japan, Korea, Singapore, and in major Chinese 
cities like Shanghai and Hong Kong. They definitely can understand and 
appreciate the culture differences in terms of working and 
communications, which are most relevant to the IETF functionality.

The more relevant thing here is that what do we actually want? Would it 
be that we need more diverse participation from the globe which in the 
end maximize the output and impact of IETF? Right now our white male 
engineers are put on the front line to be 'scrutinized' under the 
'diversity' microscope, what if a couple years later, the trend shifts 
to Asians? or Latin America or Australians or Africans. Sorry, I really 
try to avoid the skin color or gender here, because I personally believe 
it is essentially off the topic of the whole IETF diversity thing we 
shall focus on.

As the title hinted, really hope the goal of this diversity movement 
does not end up into against or wiping out "white male" from IETF, just 
because people 'firmly' believe they are the ones controlling the whole 
scene and resources, and won't let it go unless a revolution is called 
upon (btw, does it sound similar to many others demanding a radical 
revolution to the existing Chinese dominant 'group'? :)

Well, if the dominant ones later being replaced by other groups, do we 
need to revamp again? What will be the end?

Thanks, particularly for tolerating such long mail,
Aaron

---

From: Pete Resnick <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 19:09:53 -0500

On 6/19/13 2:47 PM, Doug Barton wrote:
> So again, it's not at all clear how that relates to the IETF (given 
> that we don't fall into the category of "the overwhelming majority of 

I think the point was that if organizations that have a majority of 
women in the ranks have trouble getting women into leadership roles 
(where one would think, ceterus paribus, women would have an easier time 
moving up as against other organizations), then an organization that has 
a majority male population won't fare much better unless there's some 
reason to believe it is interestingly different.

Institutional biases in organizations are not uncommon. We almost 
certainly have *some* brand of it here, whether it's Americo-centrism 
(cf. SM's comments about Selma and Dan's comments about baseball), or 
one of gender. I'd be (happily) shocked if there were some reason to 
believe that we're different than other organizations when it comes to 
gender, but I haven't seen much to convince me we're all that different. 
Certainly we should look for evidence of the existence and nature of any 
biases that exist in our institutional practices, but given how 
prevalent such biases are elsewhere, I'm not uncomfortable presuming 
prima facia that we do have some and doing some things that might 
(again, surprisingly to me) turn out unnecessary.

> I look at women like Leslie Daigle, Allison Mankin, Margaret 
> Wasserman, Lynn St. Amour, Joyce Reynolds ... those are just off the 
> top of my head; certainly not my intention to slight anyone ... all of 
> whom have now, or have had significant leadership roles, and made 
> lasting impacts on the IETF both in its work product and culture.

As the saying goes, the plural of "anecdote" is not "data", but it might 
be interesting to discuss with each of the people you noted their 
experiences getting into leadership and their experiences in it. 
(However, see the last paragraph of this message below.)

> every door is open to her.

Agree wholeheartedly.

> institutional bias, especially when that point is far from proven.

Even if such a bias does not exist, it can come across a bit 
self-serving to complain about the banging drum. So someone has said 
there is an institutional bias against the (minority and not in 
leadership) group they are in and for the (majority and in leadership) 
group you are in... No use in getting insulted or complaining about the 
words used to express that perception. Looking to make sure that there 
is no bias and addressing any biases you find is a good use of time and 
energy.

> It's not a "line of argument," it's a legitimate question.

It did sound a bit confrontational in the original message. The MIME 
Intonation Protocol being what it is, this can sometimes be an 
unintended problem. I will take full blame for the lack of deployment of 
that protocol.

> Others have described their actions to help improve the situation, 
> which hopefully still others can latch onto and emulate. You bring a 
> unique perspective to the table, so I'm hoping that you can describe 
> what you're doing to help solve the problem so that others can emulate 
> your example.

That's a reasonable request. People should in general describe 
experiences and volunteer whatever advice they can for the community. 
However, do keep in mind that some things folks might do (especially 
folks in the minority population) are not things that they necessarily 
want to talk about it public. For example, if some folks were helping 
women off-list to deal with incidents of harassment or sexist behavior, 
or simply poor treatment that seemed different than how males were 
treated, they might not feel comfortable talking about that publicly 
because it would bring up some thorny issues that are difficult to 
discuss in private, let alone in public. And there are certainly other 
things of less serious import that are still dicey to lay open in 
public. So it's probably at least a bit pushy to individualize a message 
saying "what are you doing to help?".

pr

-- 
Pete Resnick<http://www.qualcomm.com/~presnick/>
Qualcomm Technologies, Inc. - +1 (858)651-4478

---

From: "Fred Baker (fred)" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 20 Jun 2013 00:14:21 +0000

On Jun 19, 2013, at 3:57 PM, Aaron Yi DING <[email-masked]> wrote:

> Well, if the dominant ones later being replaced by other groups, do we need to revamp again? What will be the end?

I'm told that white babies are now a minority of the population in the US. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2341066/Whites-soon-minority-American-children-age-5.html

It's all about political correctness. It is not politically correct to comment on women unless you are one and hate men. It is not politically correct to comment on whatever-they're-called-this-week, black, negro, afro-americans, or whatever. It is not politically correct to comment on hispanics, or to note that they are not a race; they might be a culture, but for the most part they are people who grew up outside spain but speak - or whose parents speak - some derivative of spanish as a native language. Or Asians, for that matter. But it is absolutely politically correct to make racist and sexist remarks - the same remarks that would draw outrage and umbrage if made about any of a list of other groups - about people who happen to be caucasian and male.

A conversation from the 1993 movie Gettysburg comes to mind. 

Colonel Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain: Tell me something, Buster... What do you think of Negroes? 
Sergeant 'Buster' Kilrain: Well, if you mean the race, I don't really know. This is not a thing to be ashamed of. The thing is, you cannot judge a race. Any man who judges by the group is a pea-wit. You take men one at a time.

I would replace "man" or "men" with "person" or "people" in the observation, and would agree with it. There are a lot of pea-wits in the world. Some of them are white males. Many are not.

---

From: Doug Barton <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 20:56:22 -0700

> reason to believe it is interestingly different.

Yes, Pete, I understand what the point was supposed to be. The point *I* 
am making is that unless you have a solid understanding of the 2 
populations the comparison is not only at best meaningless, it is almost 
certainly actively harmful because it leads to a short-circuit of the 
very path to understanding that is required to actually address the 
problem. I could count all of the unfounded assumptions you're making 
just in the paragraph above for you, but you're a smart guy, I'm sure 
you can take that on as a side project if you're interested.

> (cf. SM's comments about Selma and Dan's comments about baseball),

So again, there is absolutely zero evidence that those kinds of comments 
are a form of institutional bias. The fact that people use cultural 
references that they are familiar with IS evidence that they are human, 
but you cannot extrapolate from Ted's comment (directed at Melinda who 
Ted had a reasonable belief would be familiar with it) that Ted is de 
facto biased against non-Americans. In fact, one of the things I enjoy 
about working in the I* realm is being exposed to other cultures, and 
learning a bit about their culture, idioms, humor, etc. And $DEITY 
forbid we actually achieve some of that diversity stuff, how are you 
going to react to even MORE people bringing their own cultural 
experience to bear in the IETF?!? The nerve of them!

> or
> gender,

For the Nth time now, let me be clear that I do not think we have zero 
problems in this area. But "we can improve" is different from "we have a 
widespread and deep-seated problem with institutional bias." More about 
the importance of the distinction below.

> but I haven't seen much to convince me we're all that different.

... remember what you said to me about anecdotes vs. data? :)

> (again, surprisingly to me) turn out unnecessary.

I find this perspective highly disturbing, and potentially very dangerous.

> experiences getting into leadership and their experiences in it.

Assuming they (and other similar folks) are willing, I agree. Just to be 
clear, I was not volunteering anyone for anything. :)

> self-serving to complain about the banging drum.

Agreed, which is why I have waited so long to speak up.

> So someone has said
> words used to express that perception.

Well I'm sorry to say, I actually DO find it insulting. There has been a 
near-constant undercurrent from one person particularly, with ripples 
vibrating through a few other ponds, that the IETF is biased generally; 
and against women particularly. As someone who is part of the 
organization, and worse yet one of those privileged (by the standards of 
many) white (gasp!) males (oh my!) I fall into the category of those 
against whom this accusation is being made, and I don't appreciate it. 
And while I try very hard not to get offended on behalf of other people, 
I personally think the (baseless, to date) accusation is insulting to 
the many people I know in the IETF of all genders, nationalities, etc. 
in whom I have not only never seen a trace of bias, but in fact have 
often seen quite the opposite. Furthermore I think that blanket 
statements of the sort "women cannot get ahead in the I* without 
institutional help" is more than a little insulting to those women who 
have, in fact, been very successful leaders already, in every sense of 
the word.

But I do agree with you about one thing, my hurt feelings (however noble 
they may, or may not be) are essentially meaningless. What I AM 
concerned about though is what the larger negative effect of the 
drum-beating is likely to be. If you want to assume that there is bias, 
go right ahead. I don't really care what your motivation is for 
encouraging outreach and equal opportunity, as long as we're working on 
the same goals.

> Looking to make sure that there

I agree with the latter, I do not agree with the former. If there are 
real examples of bias that are known, they definitely should be 
addressed. If the organization believes that we have a problem, and 
wants to spend precious resources on a proper study to answer that 
question, well, Ok then. However we've already demonstrated that people 
are very bad at extrapolating useful conclusions from anecdotes, I don't 
think encouraging people to do more of that is a useful exercise.

... and it's not for nothing that a couple of people much smarter than 
me have posted some preliminary data analysis that seems to demonstrate 
that the believed bias problem does not exist. I find it interesting 
that their work has been ignored and/or shouted down since it doesn't 
fit the narrative.

> unintended problem. I will take full blame for the lack of deployment of

... and I will take full blame for not making my purpose more complete. 
I thought it was obvious from context, but I can see how it could have 
been interpreted differently.

> want to talk about it public.

Of course.

> For example, if some folks were helping

I see your point, however I really think it should go without saying 
that what you describe above isn't what I was referring to (assuming 
what you're describing is actually occurring at all).

To be totally clear, I'm interested in what the women actively involved 
in the IETF now are doing, have in mind to do, or think should be done 
to encourage more active participation by women; both those who are 
"involved" but not "active" currently, and those who have no current 
association with the IETF at all. As a PWM I would not want to presume 
to tell women how to best get other women involved, I think it's much 
better to hear it from them.

Doug

---

From: "GT RAMIREZ, Medel G." <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 20 Jun 2013 12:50:53 +0800

Kathleen,
Thanks, well understood  indeed... I hear you.

Medel Ramirez
Globe Telecom, Inc.
Manila , Philippines.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++

-----Original Message-----
From: [email-masked] [mailto:[email-masked]] On Behalf Of
Moriarty, Kathleen
Sent: Thursday, June 20, 2013 12:11 AM
To: Melinda Shore; Peter Saint-Andre
Cc: [email-masked]
Subject: RE: IETF Diversity

A little earlier in the thread, ways to improve things came up.  I
presented at an international conference in Bangkok this week on the
subject area covered by MILE.  While the focus was intended to be more
on how we can look at the problem space to make faster/more effective
progress, standards will enable some of those activities.  The second
half of the talk provided background on MILE, what we are trying to do
and gave the audience a general challenge as well as had specific
requests for help.  My last slide was on how to engage in the IETF.
Outreach and helping people understand how they can be effective within
the IETF may be useful for other WGs as well and could help improve
diversity.  I had 2 requests following the talk to give the same
presentation at other conferences and will likely do them to assist in
this area as well as to make faster progress (and hopefully drive people
to think about how to share information more effectively.  There are
many opportunities for people to help in this space.  

Best regards,
Kathleen
________________________________________
From: [email-masked] [[email-masked]] On Behalf Of Melinda
Shore [[email-masked]]
Sent: Wednesday, June 19, 2013 12:00 PM
To: Peter Saint-Andre
Cc: [email-masked]
Subject: Re: IETF Diversity

> very long time.

You made an assertion that's at least a little ahistorical, you used it
to support an argument against organizational change, and when I
disagreed you went to the "Let's not talk about it" place.

Melinda

This e-mail message (including attachments, if any) is intended for the use of the individual or the entity to whom it is addressed and may contain information that is privileged, proprietary, confidential and exempt from disclosure. If you are not the intended recipient, you are notified that any dissemination, distribution or copying of this communication is strictly prohibited. If you have received this communication in error, please notify the sender and delete this E-mail message immediately.

---

From: "Moriarty, Kathleen" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 20 Jun 2013 01:07:01 -0400

Thanks, Medel.

I just wanted to clarify that my closing 'in this space' was intended for diversity improvements.  Getting more users, operators, and vendors involved will help.  Having diverse input will help us have better solutions come out of the WG.

Thanks,
Kathleen 

Sent from my iPhone

---

From: Mark Nottingham <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 20 Jun 2013 08:02:18 -0700

Keep in mind that you're talking to an organisation that believes that Vancouver qualifies as "Asia."

--
Mark Nottingham   http://www.mnot.net/

---

From: SM <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 20 Jun 2013 11:26:52 -0700

>that Vancouver qualifies as "Asia."

That should be added to the Tao. :-)

At 08:24 20-06-2013, John C Klensin wrote:
>Political convenience and expedience trumps geographical reality
>every time :-)

The question I would ask is how many continents are there.

Regards,
-sm

---

From: "Fred Baker (fred)" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 20 Jun 2013 21:05:36 +0000

> The question I would ask is how many continents are there.

One. The rest are islands. Asia, by the way, is a peninsula sticking out from Europe.

Now that we've cleared that up...

---

From: "Dan Harkins" <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 22 Jun 2013 22:36:14 -0700 (PDT)

> the application layer they become central.

  Interesting. Can you explain what it is about the application layer
that introduces gender and cultural issues?

> a problem that I think can be usefully addressed in an open consensus

  Internet stalking? Maybe you should call for a BoF to address the issue.
I'm not sure what protocol can be developed, or modification to an existing
protocol, that can address the stalking problem but I'm all ears!

> personal perspective which is why I actively seek out other perspectives.

  Some backgrounds and perspectives aren't all that helpful. Would you
like my liddite father's perspective? How about the brother of a friend
of mine who has been institutionalized and is quite insane? We need to
get requirements from people who understand and will use our protocols.
If those people are all the same background then oh well, but creating
"diversity" by just adding people of the correct background will not make
our standards better.

  Which says nothing about having more women in I* leadership positions.
That may be great. Or it might not be. It depends on whether the people
have clue or not.

  See, that's the thing. IETF needs people who have clue not people who
are members of some protected group that has been declared to be
underrepresented.

> an IESG with only one female member who is not ex-officio (according to

  Can you restate that as a problem? And also explain why it is a problem?

> natural response is 'why the heck am I bothering wasting my time here'.

  An opposing view is one that thinks this whole diversity issue is crap.
Do you want to ensure that people who view the diversity issue as crap are
included in the consensus being built? How many people who are currently
on the diversity mailing list view the whole endeavor as crap? If it's zero
(which is my prediction), then isn't that a problem with the diversity of the
diversity group? Won't the output of that group suffer because they are
all of the same mindset?

> grad students the same is usually true today.

  Gosh. I feel so left out. I'm as old as EKR (and probably you) and have
been
involved in the IETF for about as long as he has yet you do not include me in
your measure of diversity. Do you think that maybe you have a problem with
measurement of the problem?

> participation and representation structures will encourage diversity.

  The IETF is a weird lot. We are predominantly "type A" personalities. There
are quite a few Asbergers cases and many more borderline functional
Asbergers cases. There are probably also quite a bit of people who have
OCD and maybe a mild case of Tourettes). So you have to explain how the
general studies of diversity mean anything here. How does having a
distribution of X:Y for some protected class increase the quality of an RFC?

  Dan.

---

From: "Dan Harkins" <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 22 Jun 2013 23:01:32 -0700 (PDT)

> that if so they are very, very far out of the mainstream.

  Civil rights? A "whites only" lunch counter or drinking fountain is
a matter of civil rights. When there is active prohibition on a class
there is a matter of civil rights. But the mere fact that the numbers
are overwhelmingly one-sided does not make a civil rights issue.

  Between 1995 and 2008, 84% of the people killed by lighting strikes
were male. Is that evidence of discrimination? Is that a civil rights
issue? What do you propose to do to rectify that statistic?

  Dan.

---

From: Randy Bush <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 23 Jun 2013 18:39:54 +0900

there appears to be a problem with your mail system.  mail which is
clearly from the 1950s is appearing on the ietf list.  somehow it has
current dates, so something is header mashing.  you may need help with
your male system.

randy

---

From: Phillip Hallam-Baker <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 23 Jun 2013 08:53:30 -0400

> that introduces gender and cultural issues?

Internationalization is not an issue for IPv6 or you are doing it really
wrong. If you get to the apps layer it becomes very important.

The IP layer does not interface to people, the apps layer does.

> protocol, that can address the stalking problem but I'm all ears!

The issue is not necessarily lets build a protocol to stop stalking.

Rather it is a question of having that context in mind when we are
discussing privacy issues. Right now the only contexts we seem to consider
privacy in are 'how does a dissident stop the government seeing what they
are talking about to others' and 'how do we stop a government catching said
dissident'.

Since the answers to both involve steganography, I don't see an open venue
as a useful place to engage in such work. But it gets raised as it is the
sort of threat men can relate to. Meanwhile rather more common threats that
we can deal with are ignored.

It is a matter of priorities.

>   Can you restate that as a problem? And also explain why it is a problem?

It demonstrates that the IETF diversity problem is not due to a lack of
qualified people. There are other factors at work.

> measurement of the problem?

My point was that there cohort ten years younger than ourselves is very
thin. The cohort ten years younger than that mostly grad students who we
seem to be unable to persuade to continue participating after they hand in
their thesis.

---

From: Phillip Hallam-Baker <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 24 Jun 2013 08:43:28 -0400

On Wed, Jun 19, 2013 at 4:40 PM, Ted Lemon <[email-masked]> wrote:

> > Yeah, and "act" is what Americans call statutes, and Selma is a city in
> Alabama where there was some controversy about voting rights. You sure need
> to know a lot of Americana to participate meaningfully in some of these
> discussions.
>
> Sorry.   That was directed largely at Melinda who is, to the best of my
> understanding, an American.   The point was that in fact the civil rights
> movement started with individuals, not the government.
>

It would have been easier to note that the technological terror we have
created has been one of the drivers behind the Arab Spring.

Before that Communism was defeated through a bottom up movement: People
just walked away.

I seem to remember that there is a country in North America where the
foundation myth is based on the claim of a bottom up revolt but I can't
quite recall which one. Something to do with tea.