Conference turris::womannotes-v1

    Has anyone in =bagels= demanded that a note be hidden, Karen?
    Therein may lie the difference.  And I would argue that, in America,
    the arab/israeli question is neither so vexed nor vexing as the
    female/male question; it's a great deal easier to be (relatively)
    calm when not personally in the line of fire.
    
    						=maggie

    I don't know if anyone has asked for a note in BAGELS to be hidden.  I do
    know that a moderator told me in an offline communication (not
    initiated by me) that he thought that one noter was expressing feelings
    of hatred, but that he was going to let that noter just talk on
    because the moderator felt that the notes written by that person would
    make his bias apparent to everyone.
    
    I am sitting here with my head in my hands at the idea of BAGELS
    being calm about the discussion there.   Note that some people
    in the BAGELS discussion, both Jewish/Israeli/Palestinian/other, have
    relatives or friends over there, some in danger of losing their
    lives.  None of our discussions here
    approaches the level of emotion in BAGELS about that topic.  All
    the more reason why it makes us look childish to engage in censorship.
    

    Well, given that it's a real rule about hiding notes when objected
    to by a reputable person for apparently legitimate reasons, how
    shall we cope?  I'm in complete agreement with you, as I daresay
    you know, that we would be far better off neither putting in
    gratuitously offensive entries nor getting all torqued when/if someone
    else does.  But it's the classic cooperate/compete gamesmanship
    theory:  cooperation is better than competition IFF everyone
    cooperates.
    
    So how do we cope?
    
    						=maggie

    
    I've read 1.7, and I can't tell from that if note suppression is 
    a corporate rule or a womannotes rule.  If it's a corporate rule,
    possibly womannotes readers/writers might agree not to suppress
    any notes.
    
    The question of people wanting notes suppressed being able to conceal
    their identity has just been dealt with in the hot button note.
    
    I'd like to hear from someone who thinks it's acceptable to suppress
    notes what their reasoning is about this topic.
    

    well start with my last answer to the hot button note. 

Re .0

......

>    I point out that BAGELS has been engaged in a discussion of the
>    Israeli/Palestinian situation for sometime, a discussion which often
>    is _extremely_ heated, but the moderators there have not seen fit
>    to delete one note.  What is it about WOMANNOTES that requires that
>    we be treated in a less adult fashion?

That may be true for the Israeli/Palestinian discussion, but I do recall 
that the moderators of BAGELS did once delete a joke which was considered
offensive to Gentiles, so your point is not well made.  It seems that the
BAGELS moderators do follow company policy , and it may be that the 
contributors to that conference show a little more respect towards each
other than some in this one do ( yourself not included, of course ).

/Mike

    I'm not sure that 'free speech' is entirely appropriate to assume
    in notes. This medium treads a line between private conversation
    and publication. The press can be sued for libel and harassment.
    Newspapers and other publishers may decide to take that risk, but 
    DEC is not in the publishing-for-money business in this case. Nor
    would they be considered crusaders for the First Amendment.
    
    Dana

    
    	I oppose the "feature" of the notes utility which removes the
    priveledges to delete *your* note once it's set hidden. I firmly
    believe there should be NO case in which the author of a note cannot
    dispose of their creation, if they so wish, at any time.
    
    	As discussed previously, there are legitimate reasons to delete
    a note. I can recall:
    	
    	1. Trash Notes - completely out of context with the current
    	   discussion or conference intent...
    	2. Personal Attacks - clearly named individual being slighted...
    	3. Mistakes - Note intended for CARBUFFS accidently entered
           here...
    	4. Advertizing a Business - not on DEC owned equipment...
    	5. Duplicate topic - that was discussed back in note 117...
                                                            
    	I also believe that it is the reader's *choice* to "take offence"
    to the presence of a particular note - or not to. However, there *is* an 
    extreme of blatancy which should not be tolerated. Random belligerance
    should also not be tolerated. These entries would be particularly
    easy to spot, I believe, by simply considering the intelligence
    level employed to construct them. I'd expect that most entries in this 
    vein would be quite thoughtlessly assembled. As such, I'd have no
    issue over their deletion.
    
    	Joe Jas

       You can get some self-serving justification in comparing one
       conference to another, but you're hardly going to prove any point.
       The policy for each conference is set by the host (file owner
       and/or system manager) and the moderators.  Period.  And if they
       have any sense, they will be mindful of corporate guidelines. 
       
       The policy for this conference is stated up front; as long as it's
       applied even-handedly, there doesn't seem much basis for
       complaint. It is too bad, though, that after a period of
       remission, yet another policy-type topic had to get started. 
       
       --Mr Topaz
       
       p.s., re Bagels/line of fire:  Maggie, some of the contributors
       to the Bagels conference work in offices in Israel.  I'd suggest
       to you that they are very much in the line of fire. 
       
       p.s jr., re .8: You are free to oppose the "'feature' of the notes
       utility which removes the priveledges[sic] to delete *your* note
       once it's set hidden";  however, you are opposing a feature
       that does not exist.

    Fair enough, Don...I think I knew that when I had time to follow
    the file, but forgot. 
    
    Joe (was it you? the short-term memory is going) as Don says, the
    author always has the privilege of deleting her/his entries.  I
    haven't checked to see whether it is impossible to delete a hidden
    note, but even if that's the case, the author can always un-hide
    it first:  the notes handler keeps no record of who hid it in the
    first place.
    
    						=maggie

       re .10 (re .8):
       
       You can delete a note that's been hidden; however, an author can
       only delete a note when accessing the conference with the same
       node::username from which the note was written.  My guess is that
       the author of .8 wrote a note from one node, tried to delete it
       from another node, got an error message, and figured that it was a
       software problem rather than user error.
       
       --Mr Topaz 

    I have found more than one note here offenisve and some that
    I considered to be downright harassement. But I never asked
    for deletion. However, I do note (mentally) who is saying what.
    And believe me there are some people in  this conference who 
    I would love to know better and some I just might file a
    formal harrasement charge against if the same behavior were
    to occur in a different setting.
    
    I hit next unseen,consider the source.
    
    I do believe that the womannotes conference is following the
    good old double standard. 
    
    And that women are allowing themselves to lose by responding
    to what I consider to be "accidents" i.e,hit next unseen to
    rid oneself of the personal vomitus that someone has written.
    
    Just an aside observation. We had an opening in our group and
    a person was voted down informally by the group because of behavior in
    notes.                            
    

    I know it's frustrating for some of us when we seem to be
    spending all our energy on the "process" of the file, but I 
    think we need to deal with things when they come up.  This file 
    is very much a microcosm of the world we live in, and I think the 
    power structures of the outside world often get expressed here.  

    I think we need to be respectful of the moderators' responsibility to 
    treat any complaint seriously.  The right to say we are offended 
    does apply to men and women equally.  I do think, however, that there 
    is a real gender difference when it comes to the exercise of certain 
    "legal" (<== in the context of policy at DEC) "rights."  In the 18 
    months or so that I've been involved with this file, I've seen a lot 
    of what I consider to be hatred of women expressed (in varying degrees 
    of subtlety), but in almost every case of offense to women, women in 
    the file try to educate the ones who offend, to say why the words hurt.  
    On the other hand, when men in this file are offended, they often demand 
    apolgies, or retractions, or deletions.  And very little is said about 
    why it feels bad.  

    The more I participate in this file, the more clearly I see a fundamental
    difference between men and women.  There are, of course, exceptions, but
    women (in this file, anyway) often seem to be concerned with
    compromise, with finding what's best for the greatest number of people 
    (often, I'll add, at our own expense - the ones who consider their own
    needs to be important get called "strident").  Men (in this file, anyway)
    often seem to be concerned with the "proper" exercise of "legal" 
    rights.  To me this seems to be an insurmountable difference, and it
    is why (in my opinion) we keep coming back to these same basic arguments
    over turf.  It's ironic that one of the ideas in that poem had to
    do with men always getting their way... and the poem was supressed.. 
    legally.
    
    Justine

    
    
    
    	My, my, my, I just love the automatic assumption that is 
    	being applied by most. Several replies here have just about
    	come right out and stated that here we go again, men are
    	running the file by having notes deleted.... 
    
    	Since nobody but the mods and the two others involved know
    	who that person was, how the H#&l did we come to that end?
    
    	I can't recall it stated anywhere that the person was male
    	or female....

    Karen, I'd love it if "free speech" worked here.  But it is an adult
    responsibility, an adult right.  We have often been faced with
    individuals who are not acting as adults, who spew verbal garbage
    into our file.  In the past, we ignored it (once the source was
    identified).  However, we had newcomers who did not recognize the
    source of such verbal diarrhea and flamed it, thus encouraging its
    proliferation.
    
    Even during the times when such garbage was recognized by all and
    NO ONE rose to the obvious bait, the individual(s) refused to go
    away, insisted on continuing to soil our file.
    
    The soil cannot stay.  It _must_ be dealt with.  The "censorship"
    is necessary.
    
    I do agree with you that Sandy's poem was wonderful, certainly _not_
    verbal diarrhea.  Someone found it offensive and knew what the mods
    HAD to do if someone objected.  That is a drag.  But isn't it suprising
    that _anything_ has lasted in the Feminist Humor note?
    
    The frigidaire note (and the one which spawned the retort which
    spawned the frigidaire reference) was verbal diarrhea.  Ignoring
    it does not remove it from the file, does not teach the individual
    to stop soiling himself (and the file).  Since I hate to look like
    I have a vendetta against Russ (I have asked that his notes be set
    hidden before), I did not feel I could be the one to ask for its
    removal.  I do wish _someone_ would, though...
    
    Lee

    in re .16 someone did complain and the note is gone.
    Bonnie J
    moderator

    Moderation in this conference is better then in some, worse then
    in others. You can't compare conferences directly. (Some of the
    conferences I think are moderated worse then this are conferences
    I moderate. As are some of the ones I think are moderated better.)
    How well a conference is moderated is determined almost as much
    by the actions of those who are not moderators as it is by the
    moderators themselves. It's hard to explain but I believe it to
    be true. [Based largely on the 10 I moderate now as well as numerous
    others I've moderated over the past few years.]
    
    How well (or evenhandedly) a conference is moderated is often a
    perception based on ones own biases regarding other Noters, specific
    topics, and specific moderators. I know people who feel (or used
    to feel) that the moderators in this conference had an anti-male
    bias and only responded to complaints from women. There are others
    who feel the opposite. Both are probably wrong but perceptions are
    different.
    
    As Don Topaz pointed out, moderation also depends on conference
    policy. If you agree with the policies and the moderators stick to 
    them you will agree that the conference is well moderated. If you 
    disagree with the policies you'll find the moderators more at fault 
    the more they stick to them.

    Notes on Digital systems are not public. Digital has no obligation
    to allow everyone to preach their own opinions. In fact, conveying
    matters of personal conviction (I think that is the final wording)
    via electronic means (VTX, Notes, Email) is explicitly against
    company policy. Much of what goes on in Notes *could* be interpreted
    as against policy. As long as things stay in acceptable bounds (ie.
    don't cause Digital to face legal action, bring out harassment charges,
    or some such) the company allows it to go on. The moderators have
    a responsibility to the company to keep the company out of trouble.
    So does every Noter but the moderators have the power to 'help'.
    
    The moderators also have some responsibility to the members of a
    conference. That responsibility is to keep trouble from escalating
    to 'management'. The reason for this is that some management people
    will take the 'easy' way out and kill the conference. It's happened
    before and there have been close calls since. If no one would
    complain to management there'd be no problem but that's not the
    real world. Some people have thin skins and will go to management
    if they are offended. If someone complains to a moderator then they
    must take some action unless there is no doubt that the complaint
    will be ignored by management/personal. To take no action is to
    risk the conference and, in some cases, ones job.
    
    Sorry to ramble on. Hope I made sense.
    
    			Alfred

    I'd barely finished typing in my request before Bonnie sent mail
    that the note had been set hidden!
    
    One of my coworkers has articles outside his cubicle about how 
    women dress suggestively to entice/annoy male coworkers.  I'm sure
    it's all in good fun (one of them's probably from the Enquirer).  Maybe I
    should post Sandy's poem outside my office--all in good fun, of
    course.  But no: I'm a coward.  Heavens!  Offend a Man?!!!  And
    I don't even know if anyone would be offended here.

    Re: .16 "verbal diarrhea"
    
    "Free speech" seems to be a moot point in the context of the restraints
    on notes files, but let me mention that it is not free speech to
    say that it applies to everything except what someone considers
    "verbal diarrhea".  That's the whole point.  One person's defense
    of feminist ideology (whatever that is) is someone else's idea of verbal
    diarrhea.  If you start saying "it applies to everyone except...",
    beware.  Someday someone will put you in the latter category.
    
    I'm assuming above that you're referring to messages with rubbish
    content, not the situations where someone floods the file with
    so many messages that people can't read the file.  The latter edges
    off into something like hecklers shouting down a speaker and
    interfering with his or her rights of free speech.
    
    The Supreme Court has said this all much better than I.....
    

    	Using the logic presented in many of the reseponses to 738.
    each city, town or state should have the right to ban books from
    store and library shelves.  Why am I not surprised?
    
    	The difference between writing a poem (the one in question was
    not seen by me) which some people find objectionable and writing
    a note which is slanderous is really the issue.  Possibly, digital
    (we haven't been DEC for a few years) has a written policy which
    defines in 'corporately acceptable' good taste but I tend to doubt
    it.  digital doees have a written policy which covers slander.
    
    	I wonder what would become WOMANNOTES if a person took a very
    strong position against all the pro-choice notes and responses and
    demanded they be removed?  And then, of course, someone would take
    a very strong stand against the pro-life notes and responses and
    demanded they be removed.  Some would write taking exception to
    pro-homosxuality notes and relies.  Then some would take exception
    to anti-homosexuality notes.  This would be followed by strong stands
    against pro-children notes and anti-children notes.
    
    	We could have nice long chats about generic hair replacement
    techniques, provided none of us ever takes a side for or against
    hair replacement and no preference or any other kind is mentioned.
    
    	We in the U.S. have little respect for our rights.
    
    Douglas

    
    
    
    I am in favor of hair replacement. 

    Re: .0 --
    
    I have to agree with you.
    
    I am deeply disturbed by a policy that allows *ONE PERSON* to determine
    what is offensive.
    
    Under this policy, it is entirely possible that if 999 of a thousand
    readers of this file felt that a particular note was wonderful,
    insightful, thought provoking, whatever, and ONE person objected, that
    ONE person could keep all the rest of us from discussing the subject.
    
    --bonnie

    FEAR is the great manipulator.
    
    Well, if this notesfile gets killed, it will get restarted and
    restarted until either it becomes permanently accepted, or too many
    of us have been terminated.  I'm willing to commit to that.

    It looks like there's no way around it. The way Digital's policies
    currently stand, means that moderators need to act if they get even
    one complaint. 
    
    examples:
    
    Case one
    
    One person doesn't like something you wrote in a conference. They
    complain to the moderator(s). The moderators set the note hidden
    and work to resolve the issues. (And believe me, most of you have
    no idea how common this can be or how much work it can take. In
    instances I've been involved in as moderator, it can take several
    hours a day for a while to work on *one* problem.) Issue either
    gets resolved, or note stays hidden/deleted.
    
    Case two
    
    One person doesn't like something you wrote in a conference. They don't
    complain to the moderators, but go directly to Personnel. They charge
    you with harassment for what you wrote. Personnel has no option but to
    do this. Legally Personnel can't make the judgment as to whether it was
    really harassment. You go on written warning which stays in your
    (closed but available if necessary) Personnel file. Conference may be
    closed, because Personnel sometimes takes a very dim view of such.
    
    It ain't fair, but it's how it works in my experience moderating
    conferences. That's why the sort of unofficial rules of most
    conferences state to complain to the author first, and then to the
    moderators. These type of problems are much easier to deal with
    at these levels of interactions. 

    Sigh.
    
    Tamzen

    Re: Case two
    
    Charming.  Of course, I suppose anyone who's accused will know who
    the accuser was, and will be able to dig out one of that person's
    notes and make a similar charge against them to Personnel.  What
    a great life.
    

        re case 2
    
        I believe you, but it still sounds like a witch hunt.
        Do we really want to work for a company that condones witch
        hunts?  Is there any effort started yet to change this?

    Re:. 29
    
    It's almost certainly not "the company".  It's the government and
    the lawyers.
    
    Re: .30
    
    What's being talked about here is not "offending the
    thin-skinned", but people who want to suppress others' ideas being
    able to do this by having their notes hidden, or trying to intimidate
    them by threatening to get them in trouble with personnel.  I somehow
    find it extremely unlikely that the man who complained about Sandy's
    note did so because his delicate feelings had been wounded and he
    wanted to prevent any other unfortunate person from suffering similar
    distress.
    

    re .31
    
    You are not correct about the motives of the person who raised
    the objections to Sandy's note.
    
    Bonnie Jeanne
    moderator

    I think what Karen means is that it's hard to see what was offensive.
    We aren't in on any dialog between the offended and Sandy, so we
    don't know about any justifications; and although we'd like to believe
    the offender, it's hard.  It's also a bit, well, reminiscent of
    things some of us have seen before.  I remember the old report about
    sexism in the computer science lab at MIT: more men were offended
    that such a survey was done than those who were shocked at the actions
    of their male colleagues or who were amazed to find that their actions
    (described to preserve anonymity) were offensive. I'm not saying
    this is the same thing!  (After all, I'm not even sure of the gender
    of the objector.)  But it is uncomfortable, especially in
    light of how many people liked reading the poem.  I wish the person
    who'd objected had considered the censorship appearance more.  It's
    too bad something more equitable could have been worked out.  Is
    there anyone else out there who found it offensive who'd be willing
    to admit it and describe why?  Could be an interesting discussion.
    
    Time to plug Dworkin's _Intercourse_ again!  (And no, she _doesn't_
    say all men are evil.)  It's about images of sexual intercourse
    and women that can be found in literature.  Great book: had me 
    laughing and crying (mostly alternately, sometimes at the same time
    :-) ).

    I think we need to be very careful here.  I wish that Sandy's note
    had not been set hidden.  However I get very uncomfortable when we
    start talking about the motives of those who complain about 
    material that is offensive to them.  It strikes me that the right to 
    complain when we are offended either belongs to all of us or it belongs
    to none of us.  So for that reason I am willing to defend the right of 
    the person who complained to do so.
             
    I personally wish, however, that the person (or persons?) who
    found Sandy's note offensive had spoken about those feelings 
    openly in the file.  I am willing to hear how men *feel* about 
    women's anger.  But I don't like it when men tell women how women 
    *ought* to feel.  To me it seems that removing a woman's expression 
    of her feelings from view is another way of directing women's feelings 
    instead of responding *to* them.  So while I defend the right of the 
    person who had the poem set hidden, I truly wish he had chosen to
    share his reaction to it instead.

    Justine

    
    
    I did not get to read the poem (would like a copy if possible) so
    I do not know what was offensive.  I do know that sometimes my
    upbringing causes me to react to otherwise innocuous ideas.  I need
    then to work it out myself without making any judgement calls on
    the other person.  If I then still find it offensive and others
    don't it is up to me to deal with it.
    
    _peggy
    
    		(-)
    		 |
    
    			Just because I don't like it doesn't make it
    			a bad idea.
    

    Re: .35
    
    I defend anyone's right to complain.  What I disagree with is the
    suppression of material complained about, and the subsequent muttering
    from the man about calling in Personnel, and all the things these
    imply.  I assume he's a "he", because Sandy, the author of the poem,
    referred to him as "he" in an off-line message to me.
                                  

    Warning! male opinion follows formfeed 8-)
    
    I think that every entry here is valuable in some way, even when
    I disagree with content or am uncomfortable with tone.  Every
    entry teaches me something about another's view of reality. *I
    am offended* when I am denied the opportunity to read what
    another noter has taken the initiative to share. 

    If a person is "offended" by an entry, that offense has already
    taken place by the time the note is hidden.  What is to be
    gained by deleting the note after the fact, except to *deny
    other noters the right to decide for themselves and the
    opportunity to learn another view?

    I agree that in the interest of civility, personal attacks
    should not be allowed. And, these are Digital's disks, and the
    moderators must do their duty as they see fit. 

    Perhaps one solution is to have the original noter insert a
    formfeed and a signpost such as:  "Warning! dead cat joke
    follows formfeed." 
    
    	bruce
    

    First of all let me say that I didn't mean my previous response
    to blame the moderators or to say that they were at fault. Under
    the present system, it doesn't appear that they have much choice.
    
    Also let me add that I was away for a long weekend, missed the original
    poem, and don't much care what the contents were.  I don't know whether
    the person who complained had good grounds for suppressing someone's
    creative effort in what is not, after all, a fully open forum.  The
    company has its own legal obligations to think of and I don't blame
    them for limiting what can be said on company equipment on company
    time. 
    
    What bothers me is the anonymous nature of the whole procedure.
    
    In any discussion, no matter how apparently innocuous, one
    thin-skinned, sensitive, narrow-minded, or otherwise intolerant
    individual can complain to the moderator(s), or to personnel, and
    succeed in getting an honest expression of opinion suppressed.
    
    It appears that the person who has been silenced has no recourse.
    
    It appears that the system does not allow you any of the common
    procedures of "due process."  You aren't faced by your accuser,
    you don't get a chance to answer, and you don't get a jury of your
    peers.  All you get is a letter in your personnel file.
    
    It worries me that people seem to have very little defense against
    charges of harrassment.  It's good that we have procedures to stop
    people of ill will from discriminating against our company's many
    minorities, but how easy for someone with a grudge to conduct a
    witch hunt, or to slander someone from the safety of Personnel! 
    
    I would be glad to find out that I'm mistaken about this.  But I'm
    worried.  
    
    --bonnie    

    RE. 39 -Isn't that what DEC is all about-whoever
    said it was a democracy!
    

    re: .40
    
    I didn't say it was a democracy.  I wasn't talking about democracy. 
    I'm talking about due process of law, which is quite a different animal. 
    
    Courts have ruled in the past that companies do have the right to
    restrict free speech and a number of other political rights as a
    condition to employment, but they've always been required to follow
    fair procedures in disciplinary action.  Fair procedures generally
    include, but are not limited to, informing the person of the charges
    against him or her and allowing that person to respond to those
    charges.  Generally, courts have felt that due process requires some
    kind of impartial hearing, with presentation of evidence. 
    
    The rules for maintaining notes conferences and disciplining violators
    of those rules do not appear to follow any of the rules of due process.
    Obviously I'm not a lawyer, but I'm worried that people are being
    treated unfairly.
    
    And now that I think about it, I'm worried that my company will
    get into trouble of a different sort for not treating all employees
    fairly.  
    
    --bonnie
    

    Our rule (i.e., implementation of corporate policy) is that the
    complaint must seem plausible on its face OR the person making the
    complaint must be someone of good repute.  In cases where it isn't
    clear just what the problem is, we try to ask questions to get a better
    handle on that.  Sometimes our questions are answered, sometimes the
    whole issue is such an emotional hook that no rational justification is
    even attempted.  But justified or not, if the weight comes down we have
    to either bend or walk away from the file.  So far, we've chosen to
    bend.
    
    As far as telling who made the complaint, we long ago decided to do
    that in order to keep down intimidation-by-nastygram.  So far, the
    system has worked reasonably well, I think; I hope it continues to do
    so.
    
    Speaking personally now, I feel upset when one of us has to hide
    something because of a "do it or I go to Personnel" armtwist; it feels
    as though we're being forced to betray the trust of the rest of the
    community. And yet we've had that done to us by both women and men in
    here, and there have been *very* few cases where we could really get in
    touch with the complainant's feelings.  Being a mod doesn't feel very
    good right about then.  It is my fervent hope --and I know that I speak
    for Bonnie, Holly, and Liz in this --that we can somehow find strong
    groundrules that allow the free expression even of unpopular opinions.
    Particularly when the opinions are held by women, because we so easily
    get shouted down elsewhere.   It's a hard problem. 
    
                                          	in Sisterhood,
    						=maggie
    

    That was a typo, Gale...it should have read "decided to NOT do that"
    
    						=maggie

    Re: few previous
    
    Uh, I'm confused, Maggie.  You decided to not tell who's complaining,
    in order to keep down intimidation?  Sure seems like it would have
    the opposite effect.
    
    Perhaps the person who complained about Sandy's poem could post
    (anonymously thru a moderator) his reason for feeling that he has to
    hide his identity.
    

    re .45
    
    I'd guess that intimidation is a two-edged sword. Identify the
    offended party, and that party is likely to be subject to a whole
    lot of negative mail (which, along with most mail about notes
    conferences, constitutes a flagrant abuse of corporate resources).
    This would be intimidating to a lot of people.
    
    On the other hand, allow gratuitous hiding of notes based on
    trivial or contrived complaints, and those with controversial
    ideas may feel intimidated about expressing them (this, I infer,
    being Karen's point).
    
    The optimal solution (allowing ideas to be expressed without
    causing actual offense) involves a certain self-restraint in
    the manner in which some ideas are presented (what's acceptable
    in your living room may not be acceptable on television; that
    kind of thing). 
    
    But I've fallen into the insidious trap of using the conference to
    discuss the conference. �Sound of wrist being slapped� 

    I apologize if this has already been answered/asked somewhere else
    in this file, but I feel that, though an anonymous person can ask
    a note be deleted or set hidden, and remain anonymous in the process,
    it is unfair to the other readers that his/her motives should not
    be explained. Would it be possible to post, anonymously, the reason(s)
    why this reader was offended? We all tend to accept better what
    we can understand, and somebody else's interpretation is as valid
    as mine, provided I am told what it is.
    
    Taking a random example: say somebody wrote a very sexually explicit
    note in here, and somebody else was offended, wouldn't it be just
    as simple for the moderators to hide the note and, in the next
    response, post the letter of the plaintiff, without identification,
    sort of:
    
    	Note 1524.14 has been set hidden at the request of a member
        of our community. His/her reasons are stated below.
    
    	*******
    
    	To the moderators,
    
    	Please delete note 1524.14. I find the language used in there
    	extremely offensive. The 3rd paragraph, which contains very
    	explicit sexual descriptions should not be used in a public 
    	conference. Both my education and my religion make me strongly
    	disapprove the use of such words.
    
    	Thanking you for your consideration, etc...
    
    	********
                                           
    As I said, this has probably been mentioned before and better,
    but I'd like to know if it's a "possibility". It would take a lot
    of heat off the topic, and off the moderators as well (maybe).
    
    Regards,   
    
    Joana Bize  
    (SHIRE::BIZE)

    
    re: .47
    
    I second this notion.
    
    

    In a number of cases, inserting a simple introduction (which ensures
    that readers will know the writer is not generalizing) would make
    a note non-offensive.
    
    I believe that if Sandy had introduced her poem by saying
    
      "This is my personal experience of some men I have met"
    
    the issue would have been much less heated.
    
    Holly

    re: Maggie's statement of the moderators' position:
    
    Maggie, what you say makes sense as far as this conference goes.  (An
    aside here: I like .47's suggestion of at least posting an explanation
    of what was so offensive that the person couldn't just enter a reply
    saying, "I find this offensive."  If someone is so offended s/he cannot
    allow the discussion to continue, the rest of us should know that so we
    can be less offensive in the future.) 
    
    What I'm concerned about is what happens outside the files.  It appears
    from what has been stated here that if someone accuses someone else of
    harrassment or other violation of company policy in the notes files,
    the accused has no recourse, no defense.  The accused has a letter put
    in his or her file, and can't even see it.  The accused is considered
    guilty without even a chance to explain her or his own side. 
    
    If I'm wrong about how these procedures work, please correct me. I
    hate believing that my company would do something like that to
    someone. (No, I am not asserting that any such thing happened in
    the case that triggered this discussion.) 
     
    --bonnie

    re .40-
    Sorry I took one of my leaps again. There is no democracy to me
    without due process. What I meant to say is that there is no
    due process at DEC.
    

    
    
    I now have a copy of Sandy's poem, on the wall of my office.  It
    is a poem and not a indictment of mem.  It is clearly about a 
    situation not about every interaction that occurs.  It speaks to
    something that is real in the universal experience of woman - wether
    we wish it or not.  If someone of "repute" was offended - I hope
    they never read any of my poetry because it will cause them to do
    themselves in with a morose dose of realitly.
    
    _peggy
    
    		(-)
    		 |
    			The Goddess allows each their own view
    			of the world without limiting other's.
    

    
    But, Holly, could a poem really be anything other than an expression
    of personal experience?  It seems to me that the disclaimer you
    propose would have to be attached to anything a woman writes in
    this file.  If that's the case... why not just add it to the file
    header:
    
    	"TOPICS THAT ARE ACCEPTABLE TO MEN and of interest to women"
        
    		Warning:  The notes in this file contain
    		          the personal opinions of their authors.
    			  Some of the material in this file may 
    		          be offensive to men who believe that 
                          women have no right to express their anger.
                      
    Holly, the sarcasm is not really directed at you but is a result of 
    my anger of yet another example of men trying to run this file....
                                                         
    If they can't control what we think; they'll find a way to control
    what we read. 
    
    And this from a "friend?"
    
    Justine
           

    re: .53 --
    
    Well put, Justine . . . 
    
    I've now seen the poem, too.  I can see being offended by it-- if
    you're one of the people it's aimed at.  Poetry is often
    offensive.  Anything that expresses personal opinions or comments
    on society is going to be offensive to someone. 
    
    That's why the Constitution included the right of free speech
    in the bill of rights.   

    But I think it's already been clearly established that we don't
    have the right of free speech in this or any other notes file.
    
    What we need to do now is establish rules and procedures that
    are fair to *everyone*, the readers and the writers as well
    as the sensitive natures who for whatever reasons aren't willing
    to simply enter a reply stating the nature of their objections.
        
    Say!  If we're censoring things that offend people, how about if
    we delete arguments about what other people said in other notes
    files?  That offends me!  If I wanted to read soapbox, I'd read
    soapbox.  I don't want to read blow by blow accounts in this file!
    Up until now I thought that as an adult woman in an adult society,
    I could deal with it by skipping over those discussions and paying
    attention to the discussions I like.  I didn't know I could just
    go to the moderator, and, as a person of presumably good repute,
    get those notes taken out.  What a weapon! 
    
    --bonnie

    p.s. Being a democracy does not guarantee individual rights
    (assuming we're both using the common definition of democracy as
    majority rule/equal participation) -- if the majority agrees that
    a minority doesn't have any rights, that might not be fair but it
    is democratic, assuming the minority was allowed to vote in the
    decision. 

    RE .50:
    
    "What I'm concerned about is what happens outside the files.  It appears
    from what has been stated here that if someone accuses someone else of
    harrassment or other violation of company policy in the notes files,
    the accused has no recourse, no defense.  The accused has a letter put
    in his or her file, and can't even see it.  The accused is considered
    guilty without even a chance to explain her or his own side. 
    
    If I'm wrong about how these procedures work, please correct me. "
    
    Well, yes and no. You can always see what is in your personnel file.
    This sort of thing is in some sort of special closed file that is
    only available to you, Legal, and Personnel after the period of
    time that you are "on report". But it is true that you really don't
    get to defend yourself if charged. You can talk all you want
    apparently, but the charge has to stand. Otherwise Personnel is
    making a legal decision that could land DEC in a lot of hot water
    if a law suit is filed, because they would be deciding sort of
    arbitrarily whether harassment or discrimination had occurred when
    that is the job of the courts.

    That's why I encourage people to be tolerant and handle things at
    the lowest possible level.
    
    Tamzen, Human_Relations co-moderator

Do we have the right of free speech in notesfiles?  NO.
Do we have the right of free speech in Digital?  NO.
Do we have the right of free speech in America?  NO.

 What is happening in the notesfile is a microcosm of the outside world. In a 
very real sense, we have given up the right of free speech in the face of 
well-meaning laws designed to prevent discrimination and prejudice. Having gone
from a situation where members of the "ruling class" (empirically white males 
of all social levels) could say whatever they wanted whenever they wanted, we
have now "swung the pendulum" to the other extreme whereby almost any person
or minority group can claim harrassment and thus control what, where and how
we say things.
 Maybe I exaggerate a little (for dramatic effect), but if you think I'm 
wrong, consider me trying to express the thought that all members of a certain
ethic/sexual/social/religious group are nothing more than animals and can be 
treated as such, rather than as humans.
 What do you think would happen to me if I put a note in the notesfile to
that effect, and a member of the aforementioned ethnic/sexual/social/religious
group saw it? 
 Inside DEC, the note would be hidden/deleted/obliterated and I might well end
up chatting to those people in personnel who have the unenviable duty of 
enforcing such laws, either for a warning or an exit interview!
 Outside DEC, I might well end up in court, being sued for various violations 
of civil rights, human rights, civil (and criminal???) laws...

 Don't get me wrong: I am in favor of the laws which prevent discrimination
and prejudice. I am aware, however, that I have given up a little of my "right
of free speech" in the interests of the "common good". I view this as a good
investment!

				Nigel

    re. Justine
    
    I have found that when I want to say something which may be construed
    as a generalization (and thus attacked), if I introduce it with
    a gentle reminder that it is *my experience* of a subset of the
    population, it is heard much better. (It'It's a reminder, not an apology.
    It relates back to the C-R rules several of us were discussing --
    each person has the right to speak for herself about her own experience.
    
    I have the 'right' to express myself *without* such an introduction,
    but I've found that I stand a better chance of being heard and not
    just reacted to *with* it.
    
    It generally works for me; there are certainly times where such
    an approach would be inappropriate.
                          
    Holly
                                                                          

    The more I read this note and its responses, the more frustrated I get
    about this whole censorship issue. As someone else has reminded
    us, we are talking about a poem: the expression of the intimate
    feelings of a person. By censoring her poem out of this file, aren't
    we, in a way, invalidating her feelings? Aren't we condoning the actions
    of people who, not content with burning witches at the stakes, also
    burnt books? 
    
    I do agree that statements like "XYZ are like cockroaches 
    and should be treated as such, give me my anti-insect spray" are
    not acceptable and should be removed from a notesfiles. On the other
    hand, in poetry or painting, a certain licence is allowed the artist, 
    because the WHOLE is a statement, not just isolated sentences taken out
    of context. Picasso's representation of women is not a description
    of a woman, so no woman needs to feel offended by it. It is a statement
    of HIS perception of women. The poetry of Paul Verlaine is sometimes
    pretty nasty to women, but it doesn't make it less poetry, or less
    valid: this is the way he sees women, and he expresses it that way.
    
    This note does not intend to criticize the moderators'action: I
    understand they had no choice in the matter, and I am sure, to coin
    a phrase in all sincerity, it has hurt them more than it has hurt us.
                               
    I think this unfortunate poem (unfortunate because of it's fate,
    not because of it's wording, which I don't know, having re-entered
    this file after a long absence too late to read it) has raised a
    very interesting and extremely worrying point, that of how much
    freedom of speech we really have versus how much we think we have...
    
    Joana
    

    Holly,
    
    If you wouldn't mind discussing this issue a little more, I think
    your suggestion about adding a reminder at the beginning of Sandy's
    poem places most (if not all) of the responsibility for male 
    discomfort on the poet.  I agree that it is often more effective to 
    remind the listener that what you are describing relates only to 
    your experience.  But I think suggesting that Sandy should have introduced 
    her poem with some sort of reminder puts the responsibility for male 
    reaction to her poem on her.  I thought this was one place where women 
    didn't have to put male comfort first.  I think your suggestion is 
    pretty close to the line between keeping the peace and accomodating 
    men at women's expense.  I don't think Sandy broke a C-R rule by 
    deciding not to add a disclaimer to her poetry.  And besides, I'm not 
    convinced that it would have made a difference.  Are you suggesting
    that the poem could get re-entered if it included some such
    statement?  My original proposition of a blanket disclaimer was rather 
    sarcastic, but should we have some group of notes set aside where it's 
    ok to express feelings honestly?  (Rated XX perhaps?)
           
    Justine                       

    Actually the person who made the objection would have had no
    problem with it (or so they told me) had there been words
    at the beginning saying something like 'this is how I feel
    sometimes' or 'this is how this kind of incident makes me feel'.
    
    Bonnie

This note is being entered for a noter who wishes to remain annonymous
    
    
Perhaps this note is appropriate here. I strongly object to a note (727.59).
It urges everyone in this conference to go read another conference topic
so that everyone can see a noter getting his clocked cleaned. 

That note made me feel very uncomfortable. It gave me the same sort
of internal uneasiness I would get back in high school days when an unpopular
student was getting his/her head beat in by a group of popular kids.
Even though I may too have disliked that student I felt horrible
that someone was urging everyone to else to view the humiliation, and I
felt terrible watching and afterwards nodding and agreeing that the dweeb
got what  was coming. 

Now this is not a perfect analogy. This is an attempt to express exactly
how that note made me feel. What should I do? I don't want to enter
into a note because I don't wish to enter the argument taking place, or
appear to be taking sides. I have no wish to offend the person who 
wrote the note because I do respect that person. And yet it bothered me
enough that I want to do something. I ask you all, what should I do?

For those wondering, this is anonymous because when I used to participate
here I constantly received unfriendly mail. I do not wish to receive any
more so I feel forced to do this anonymously. That fact also adds to my
dilemma.

    Having asked for, and received, a copy of The Poem, I am again amazed
    at the seemingly-paranoiac reactions we see to incredibly innocuous
    (sp?) things written by women. At the risk of repeating what wiser
    women than I have already said, men have said absolutely OUTRAGEOUS
    things here, and women have rushed in to raise consciousness, not
    threaten legality.
    
    Could it be that we still believe "legality" will not support women?
    
    Could it be that we're right?
    
    --DE
    

    re .60
    
    I don't mind discussing this, Justine.  We may have a difference
    of opinion, but that's ok, too.  (I am speaking for myself and not
    as a moderator, by the way.)
    
    I can't speak for anyone else in this, so I'll tell it from my point
    of view.
    
    My goal is to be heard, not to make anyone more comfortable.  In
    some cases putting an introductory note such as I described above
    effectively diffuses any opposition, and readers who would rather
    fight with me are left with only 2 choices:  read it as an expression
    of my experience, or 'next unseen'. 
    
    I don't think Sandy -should- have done anything differently.  I
    think if her goal had been to be heard (as mine would have been)
    with the minimum of hassle, one way of achieving that goal would
    have been to add an introductory note which would serve as a reminder
    that she was not using a corporate tool to discriminate against
    any group or class of people, but was instead describing her own
    experience.
    
   > I thought this was one place where women didn't have to put male
   > comfort first.  I think your suggestion is pretty close to the line
   > between keeping the peace and accomodating men at women's expense.  I
   > don't think Sandy broke a C-R rule by deciding not to add a disclaimer
   > to her poetry.  And besides, I'm not convinced that it would have made
   > a difference.  
    
    This is not about male comfort for me.  I imagine that the range of men
    that read this file have regular reactions along a wide continuum of
    comfort to discomfort to everything that is said here.  Sometimes I
    like to talk/write to some of the angry men calmly and quietly, but I'm
    not trying to make them comfortable.  I'm trying to get their attention
    to see if really hearing what some of us are saying (rather than
    escalating angry taunts) makes any difference.  I don't worry about
    comfort. 
    
    I don't think Sandy broke a C-R rule, either.  To me breaking a C-R
    rule would be person A telling person B that no, person B did not
    have the experience she just described and did not feel the way
    that she said she did.  I referred to the idea of C-R in the sense
    that once someone establishes that she is speaking about her own
    experience, others need to respect that.   
    
    To reverse the situation, I would find a note from a man that says
    "Women are frigid bitches" unacceptable, but I am willing to accept
    that a man who says "my wife and my girlfriend are both frigid bitches"
    may be speaking about experiences that I have no way of evaluating.  I
    don't necessarily accept it as true, but at least the individual
    is not generalizing about women as a class.   
    
    If a man wrote a funny/sarcastic poem in mennotes (which I don't read)
    about women in general, I can imagine objecting to that fact that his
    generalizing felt discriminatory, especially since corporate resources
    were being used.  If a man prefaced the same poem with a note that he
    had been in some frustrating relationships with women, and this poem
    was about those relationships I would be less likely to object. 
    
    It's certainly not a clear cut area.
    
    > Are you suggesting that the poem could get re-entered
    > if it included some such statement? 
      
    I don't know.  If I were the writer, I would probably try something
    like that if my goal were to be heard.
    
    I'm not happy with the situation as it stands now, by the way.  
    I share your concern about women needing a place to 'tell it like
    it is' without having to explain themselves.  I also can see the
    potential problems that could arise using this particular form of
    communication.
    
    (Speaking as a moderator now)  I am meeting with someone on the
    Valuing Differences staff to discuss these problems and to try to
    figure out a way to allow any one group to express anything they
    want to express without creating a proverbial situation where one
    person's desire to 'swing a fist' violates another person's desire
    to 'protect their nose'.   There are no easy answers, but we are
    looking for some creative alternatives to the present situation.
    
    Holly
    

    re.63
    
    Woman noters always enter notes to make others womannoters aware of
    certain events, notes, attitudes, articles, etc.  The conference that
    the author was referring to is extremely degrading towards women and
    womannoters were made aware of it.  I see nothing wrong with this. 
    I was one of those people that went to the other conference to read
    the note, and I am glad it was brought to my attention.  I understand
    this person better and I am trying hard to learn to ignore his
    women humiliating notes.
                                                                      
    Suzanne
    
    P.S. I am often offended by the notes entered by this person in
    womannotes and feel that he is always trying to clean "woman's clocks".
    He reminds me more of the boy in school who always ran around and
    picked up girls dresses to see their underwear and then later wondered
    why he was so unpopular with them. 

    
    To the author of .63
    
    I was also troubled by that note you mentioned, and I appreciate
    that you raised your objections to it here instead of lobbying
    to have the note deleted.  I'm particularly saddened (even worried)
    to find that you feel unable to note here because of "unfriendly 
    mail."  On occasion, it does seem to make sense to continue a 
    conversation from this file off-line, but I hope we all keep in mind 
    that sending mail is a real intrusion.  We don't have to read notes, 
    but we do have to read our mail.  
           
    Justine

    Oh, good grief.  The poem was posted to the HUMOR topic.
    Er, um excuse me for yelling.  But it was posted to the humor topic.
    What about the salary getting cut in half joke?  Does anyone assume
    that that happens to all transsexuals?  (I told that joke here, and
    offended one of my coworkers!  And no, he isn't a transsexual.)
    
    It was a poem!  Only Whitman thought he was everybody all at once,
    but I can allow him his presumptions because of his insights.
    
    And nobody needs to tell anybody to go read SOAPBOX to see someone's
    clock get cleaned: it gets cleaned right here, folks.  I dare say
    if you don't like Suzanne's note, you don't like a few of mine--
    but you sure haven't written to me about it.  But it doesn't matter,
    anyway: if you don't know what SOAPBOX is about and how 'boxers
    treat each other, you haven't read much SOAPBOX.  It's a public
    notesfile: you post there, and everyone abuses you of your notions.
    
    It's a pretty sad day when a woman's voice describes an inequality,
    and she gets silenced and labelled "sexist".
    
    If you think that poem was offensive, you'd probably explode if
    you read _Intercourse_.

    re: the pointer to s'box_'88
    
    Although I share some of the discomfort, my general reaction is
    gratitude for the pointer.  While there does seem to be an element
    of "beating up on the unpopular kid", it feels more like "justified
    response" to someone who popped off with an off-the-wall remark
    and one that has the appearance of wanting to start a fight
    (vs. wanting to start an intelligent discussion).  If what we're
    trying to do is learn about each other, our thoughts and attitudes,
    then I think it's fair to say that the 'box note is a valuable
    lesson in learning about a person who has been, uh, active here,
    to say the least (personal aside: and whatta lesson!)
    
    Seems to me that ultimately, he took the first swing and was in
    a crowd when he did it; I find it hard to escape the notion that
    he deserves the result.  NOTES is, to my mind a pretty safe place
    to pull this kind of stuff; were someone to pull the same stunt
    in a crowded bar, I imagine the "reply" would be considerably more
    hazardous to his health.  As a cop, I often picked up those left
    lying around after such "discussions". . .
    
    Steve

The following entry is from a noter who wishes to remain anonymous

	I have decided to post this story now, because it's true and
it fits into this whole scenario being discussed.   I am writing this
letter anonymously, for reasons that I think will be obvious.

	Over the last few years, I have participated in "Notes" and
have found many friends here at Digital.   These friendships have
been formed through personal communications, in person, and also using
"Notes" and "Mail".     But last year I was approached by my manager
one day, and taken to a meeting with our Personnel rep.    It seems
that someone had obtained copies of personal letters I had sent over
the Enet.   Someone *not* the person I had sent the letters to!
I was not ever told who had complained, and was told not to ask.   I was
never able to find out how these mail messages had been copied, who
had done the copying and turned them over to department management.
I know that the person I sent the mail messages to was *not* involved
in the complaint.    I was profoundly disturbed by the way I was "tried 
and convicted" with no jury, and no real recourse to appeal.    I could 
only appeal the decision to the same managers who had hung me for my 
"crime".   I was placed on warning for 90 days, and several restrictions 
were put on me for that period, which is now over.

During this time I learned several dangerous lessons about the use
of company computers;

	Any use of "Mail" for personal messages of any kind is against
	the Digital policy which forbids the use of company resources
	for anything regarding "Personal philosophy or conviction".

	There *is* a single loophole, that allows "Notes" to be so used,
	but *only* for discussions that are open for everyone to read.

	"Mail" is *not* included in this loophole.    

	Therefore;   When people in the notes files say;  "this isn't
	appropriate here, take this discussion to private mail."   Please
	be aware that private discussions in mail are forbidden by the
	current wording of the policy.

	Current policy supposedly is that your personal mail file is
	your own, and supposedly your privacy cannot be arbitrarily
	violated.   But *if* some hacker does get copies of your mail,
	then all evidence apparently may be used against you!   *BEWARE*!!!!
	THERE IS APPARENTLY NO PROTECTION FOR THE EMPLOYEE AGAINST THE 
        MISUSE OF MAIL FILES, EVEN IF THEY WERE OBTAINED IN A CRIMINAL MANNER.
	
	I was told I had misused company resources, although what I had
	been doing was quite within acceptable tradition, as I saw it.   
	I was told that the time stamps on these messages (12:00, 9:00, etc)
	showed that I had done this on "company time", even though I
	am exempt, and don't have a well defined daily schedule, and even
	though the times were legitimate break times, and even though I
	was meeting my project deadlines.

	What's more, I was held responsible for breaking a policy that
	was distributed to us *after* the mail messages were sent.  Some
	of the messages were over a year old at the time.


	I believe there are some real problems here.   We *don't* have
freedom of speech here.   We don't have the protection of rules of evidence 
or a right of appeal or judgment by our peers.

	The way the rules are currently written, any person may be
dismissed or punished for *any* use of mail that is not directly
related to Digital's business.    I believe we should fight for our
freedom here in Digital, and we should insist on the right to some
meaningful form of appeal for such autocratic decisions.    The current
system IS NOT FAIR.   IT IS NOT RIGHT!!!

		Thank you for your patience in reading this.

    re: .70 & .71
    
    I believe Eagles is right on the mark in noting that =wn=, and
    electronic conferencing in general, is in a formative stage.  I
    would add that this is also true about the laws involving 
    computer usage.  I imagine that it'll be a while before the
    legal dust settles enough to allow us a lot of clarity about what
    are or are not legal behaviors when using a computer.  In the meantime
    it would seem that it might be better to exercise caution.
    
    Steve
    

    Not to drastically change the topic, but one thing here I find strange
    is some anonymous postings.  Oh, not the hard stuff, like talking
    about your own personal experiences with rape, or abortion, or
    alcoholism, or job problems, or I guess anything where you've been
    a victim.  But being worried about expressing your own opinion?
    Isn't that what this notesfile is all about?

    RE .73  "Once burned, twice shy"  maybe ?  I have been warned offline
    to raise my paranoia level. .71's experience confirms the need.
    DEC's first concern is covering the corporation's backside, NOT
    that of an employee caught with their pants down.
    
    RE.71 thank you for sharing that, in view of the risks you felt
    you took.
    
    RE any and all correspondents - I don't save mail messages, your
    safe :-)/2

    Dana

    (From the person who complained about Sandy's poem.)

    I complained anonymously because "I feel this ... note constitutes
    sexual harrassment."  While Sandy may have intended it to describe
    only certain individuals, it was written in such a way as to pertain
    to all men: "We men are here to rule in life..."

    How would you feel about the poem if "Men" were prefaced by some
    specific ethnic or religious designation.  How would you feel about
    a poem that, with the same skill Sandy brought to her writing, described
    how women dressed and flaunted their bodies only to arouse men.  You
    can find several passages of that flavor in Clavel's novel "Whirlwind"
    that you might find disturbing if you read them out of context.

    While you're at it, you might try re-reading note 181 (on bathing-suit
    posters in offices).  The message that was made clearly and explicitly
    in that note is that if you are offended by a photograph in my office
    I must remove it.  Period.  Without backtalk or questions about your
    motives or aesthetic sensibilities.  I cannot offer to compromise by
    covering part of it up; nor may I tell you that it doesn't apply to you
    personally, but merely expresses my feelings about certain women I know.

    I find it somewhat sad that we will not give to others the rights
    of feelings and beliefs that we expect for ourselves.
    
    Still a friend.

    Well, if you don't like Sandy's poem, why don't you object to more
    of Russ's notes?  He's advocated male supremacy.  Isn't that just
    as offensive from him?

    Re: "We men"
    
    The point of the poem's use of "We men" was that that expressed
    the feelings of the man in the poem, not that Sandy thinks all men
    are like that. So, because you didn't read it carefully, a number
    of people haven't been able to read it at all.
    
    You still haven't explained why you feel you can't sign your name
    to your opinions.
                            

    Also, you clearly have a problem with the point of view character:
    the narrator of this poem doesn't speak for all men, but he is speaking
    from his model, which says that all men can touch all women.  It's
    not the poem itself that is offensive, but a person who does hold
    this belief is offensive.  Perhaps you don't believe such people
    exist--then I suggest you read SOAPBOX note 187, and meet just one
    such person.

    I DID put in a disclaimer!!   Check it out again.
     
    
            <<< VIKING::$2$DJA6:[NOTES$LIBRARY]WOMANNOTES.NOTE;1 >>>
                        -< Topics of Interest to Women >-
================================================================================
Note 692.26                      Feminist humor                         26 of 27
CSSE::CICCOLINI "Note-orious"                        57 lines  23-FEB-1988 12:56
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

    I was feeling a little aggravated and sarcastic some months ago
    when I penned this one...
    
    .
    .
    .
    
    
    And how does the speaker of my poem, when he says
    
    "We men are here to rule in life"
    
    Differ from the speaker of the poem who said,
    
    "If I had a penis....I'd force it on females"?
    
    Both are sarcastic peices of humor and both mean exactly the same
    thing in terms of the complainer's complaint.  Now all men don't
    force their wangs on females but what is it about my poem that makes
    "him" feel I DO mean that all men do what it says in the poem? What?
    
    Or is it really about me?  I think he really wants to have ME hidden
    and deleted!  ;-)
    
    And what really cracks me up the most is, here is this "offendee".
    He goes into a woman's notesfile, sees a topic marked "Feminist
    Humor" and says to himself, "Hmm, I think I'll read that" and does
    so.  And then WE have to flog ourselves for what he sees?
    
    Would you walk into a topless bar and rag on the owner because the
    waitresses were naked?  The logic seems the same to me.  The guy
    may as well visit Alaska and be against snow for as ridiculous as
    this whole thing is. 
    
    But I'm laughing it off.  We're all so serious here!  I know there
    are real things to be considered, free speech and all, but this
    is a DEC notesfile.  We play by DEC's rules or we just don't play.
    
    I say let him take offense.  Everyone who wants the poem has it
    or can get it.  He didn't supress anything.  It's a hollow victory.
    Let's be satisfied with that, drop it and move on.  I really don't
    want to be at the core of a big hoo-ha.  I really thought that after
    "If I Had a Penis", this little ditty would be nothing.  I was wrong.
    
    So we've got some sensitive people reading notes.  We all know that.
    Let the complaint stand!  The strong have a duty to protect the
    weak!  ;-)            (Ooooh, I can hear it now!!!!)

    
    Gee, Sandy, I've been thinking of you through all of this and wondering
    if all this conflict was making you uncomfortable.  Thank you for
    reminding us all that there was in fact a disclaimer at the
    beginning of the poem.  I feel bad that such a personal expression
    (a poem) has been at the center of this debate.  I really like
    your poem, and most of us (I imagine) would not have the courage
    to share something like that here.  It seems to me that you've
    managed all of this very well, and ironically, the suppression of
    your poem has in fact given more credence to the tendencies your
    poem described.                               
    
    In sisterhood,
    
    Justine

    Uncomfortable that men exist who object to my words, my sarcasm,
    my ideas?  I've lived my whole life with my ideas.  Notesfiles aren't
    the first place I've aggravated men simply by not being a sweet, quiet,
    happily gullible little cuddly-toy pleased as punch with any crumbs I 
    can get a man to give me.  ;-)
    
    And it doesn't take any courage to express myself.  I'm not testing
    any waters, "I yam what I yam"!
    
    The problem is the noting medium itself in that when you a read
    a note you are reading only a particular part of a person.  Some people
    think they are seeing the whole person and extrapolate an idea into
    an entire way of life.  The poem was sarcastic and so it is assumed
    by some that I AM a sarcastic, nasty person.  I'm not.  I CAN be,
    as evidenced by the poem, but so can everyone of you reading this.
    You all have some real nasty sides and you've all let them show
    at one time or another.
    
    And I guarantee that not a one of you expected your nasty side to
    be mistaken for your entire being.  In notes, readers only get a
    small window to look through.  I understand that.  I don't take
    the attacks as attacks on my being because womannotes are NOT who I 
    am.  They are only an outlet for who I CAN be; a potential that is 
    no different from anyone else's.
    
    So I'm not ashamed that my ability to be sarcastic is known - I
    assume everyone else has the same ability, more or less.  I believe
    "Feminist Humor" was the right outlet for my sarcasm, and I even
    warned the readers that the poem was conceived in aggravation and
    executed in sarcasm.  I don't feel any responsibility beyond that
    so the furor can go ahead and rage all around me - I'm not even going 
    to get my hands dusty.
    
    I have my own OPINION about this, to be sure, and my own ideas about
    the REASONS behind the objection, but that doesn't mean anything
    at all here.  Anyone who wanted to read the poem has done so, and now
    you know the objector's reasons.  As far as I'm concerned, there's
    really no more to discuss.  Everything's on the table, (except his
    identity and even THAT fact is significant!), and everyone gets
    to draw their own conclusion.  I don't think notesfiles are in the 
    business of pronouncing who is right and who is wrong so that question 
    is not an issue here.   
    
    Um, Father may I say that??  ;-)

    re: .81 --
    
    Sandy, I admire your well-thought-out response and your objective
    position relative to suppression of your own thought.  I certainly
    wouldn't be so calm if it were my work being censored by an intolerant
    and anonymous man.
    
    In fact, I'm not so objective and calm about your being censored
    by an intolerant unnamed man.
    
    I'm furious.
    
    I'm not saying the moderators could have done anything else under
    the circumstances.  It's just another incident of male supremacy,
    not really to surprising.
    
    But I'm still furious.
    
    --bonnie

    Free speech is a most precious freedom.  The potential for knowledge
    that free speech offers to the people of a free country must be
    acknowledged.
    
    When viewing the evening news on t.v. last night seeing a teenaged 
    boy on trial for murdering another teenaged boy I found it most 
    offensive.  My teenaged son was watching it with me and he also
    found it disturbing.  (Note:  "I found" and "he found" are our
    opinions.)
    
    Even though some of what we as people in a free country hear, see,
    read or write is not pleasing at all times from the perspective
    of all people never the less it all still happens.  
    
    We would not be living in a free country if that instance on the
    evening news (teenage murder) was HIDDEN from view of all people,
    even as offensive as I found it to be.
    
    In my opinion, free speech is an important goal to continue to work
    toward.
    

  Re: .75

  >    While you're at it, you might try re-reading note 181 (on bathing-suit
  >    posters in offices).  The message that was made clearly and explicitly
  >    in that note is that if you are offended by a photograph in my office
  >    I must remove it.  Period.  Without backtalk or questions about your
  >    motives or aesthetic sensibilities.  I cannot offer to compromise by
  >    covering part of it up; nor may I tell you that it doesn't apply to you
  >    personally, but merely expresses my feelings about certain women I know.

  I decided against re-reading the 200 entries in topic 181 because I
  don't have the time.  However, my recollection of that discussion is not
  at all the same as yours.  As I recall, the thrust of 181 was that some
  women were uncomfortable (for a variety of reasons) in the presence of
  such a poster or picture.  And that once the owners of such posters were
  aware of the discomfort it caused, they might feel differently about
  keeping such posters around. There might have been an individual or two
  who said that such posters should be forbidden but that was certainly
  not the consensus.  And I don't recall any mention of anyone being
  forced to take a picture down.  If you can refute my impressions of the
  discussion in .181 with specific reply numbers, please supply them. 

  >    I find it somewhat sad that we will not give to others the rights
  >    of feelings and beliefs that we expect for ourselves.

  I find this statement more than somewhat amusing.  Your perception
  (mistaken, in my opinion) of the thrust of 181.* is that cheesecake
  pictures should be forbidden. You are against such censorship.  You then
  *perpetrate* the same censorship offense you accuse the readership of
  *contemplating* -- and you've got the unmitigated gall to express
  sadness that such things happen!
    
  >    Still a friend.

  With friends like you, who needs enemies?

  JP

    The answer to repression is not more repression. 
    
    When a group is repressed, it does no good to repress the group
    in power, too.
    
    The only answer to repression is FREEDOM.
    
    For women.  For men.  For all races and nationalities and religions.
    
    For all ideas and dreams.
    
    --bonnie

        I read the poem,  and  it  should never have been set hidden or
        complained over. (in my opinion!)
        
        Why not  repost  it with a form-feed ahead of it, and a warning
        that this is  one woman's feelings at a point in her life where
        she was angry enough to write this? 
        
        'Freedom's just another word for nothin' left to lose...'
        
        Andy.
        
        

    
    many of the discussions in this string have centered around possible
    scenarios, not around what has actually happened. we can "what-if"
    ourselves to death, but the bottom line is that a community such as
    this one has to rely on trust. that trust centers on the moderators and
    on the other participants. without this essential ingredient, you might
    as well be in another file.
    
    liz (the person) 

    Several people have kindly taken me to task over an apparent
    inconsistency in my position, so let me add what I hope is a
    clarification (the last time I tried to clarify something I only
    muddied things horribly):
    
    .85 is trying to say that I hope I would be just as upset if someone
    deleted a nasty poem a man had written about a woman.  
    
    I fail to see how a poem, any poem, written in the first person
    can be a generalization.  It might present a portrait of a person
    who generalizes, but the poem itself ultimately pictures only one
    person.  Robert Browning's "My Last Duchess" comes to mind.
    Browning is extremely nasty about the Duke in that poem.  The Duke
    is spiritual kin to the unnamed man in Sandy's poem.  No one
    suggests that Browning intended to say all men would like to
    murder their wives! 
    
    Even if it did generalize -- well, generalizing is faulty
    reasoning, but does that justify censorship??   Free speech allows
    people to make jackasses of themselves in public if that's their
    inclination.  It allows the rest of us to laugh and point out
    the donkey's ears, too.
    
    .81, expressing my helpless rage over the situation,
    is trying to say that the anonymous protestor's protestations that
    this note might get in trouble is another example of a man telling
    a woman, or in this case a group of women, what's good for us. 
    
    And let me repeat for perhaps the dozenth time I DON'T THINK
    THERE WAS ANYTHING ELSE THE MODERATORS COULD HAVE DONE UNDER
    THE CIRCUMSTANCES.   Sorry to shout but people have apparently
    not been understanding this.  The moderators did what they
    had to do -- a difficult job done well.
    
    I'm deploring the narrow-mindedness that made their action
    necessary and the social context that made the poem a problem.
    
    --bonnie 

    The difference between my poem and cheescake on guys' walls is ACCESS.
    
    If I had my poem on my cube wall I'm not so sure I'd have a leg
    to stand on if a man saw it in the normal course of his work day
    and complained.  I'd take it down in a minute if NOT for the altruistic
    reason of being decent to people then CERTAINLY for the selfish
    reason that I want to be thought of as an "ok kinda guy".
    
    But this poem had to have been SEARCHED OUT first in womannotes,
    then in the topic marked "Feminist Humor" and THEN past the disclaimer.
    It contained no swears, no obscenities, no bathroom or excretory
    references, no violence, no racism and no REAL sexism either.  Just
    a lot of openly admitted sarcasm like "If I Had a Penis" which no one 
    objected to.
    
    There is absolutely NO parallel whatsoever between a poem, duly
    introduced and properly placed in a topic reserved for such things,
    and a provocative picture displayed out in the office where everyone 
    must conduct their business.  No one's normal course of business takes
    them into "Feminist Humor" in Womannotes.
    
    I'm behind the moderators and the policy 100% and I never contested
    the deletion but I remain unsympathetic to the offended.
    

Mr. anonymous

Since I can't write to you offline I must post this here.


Re: .75

>>  I complained anonymously because "I feel this ... note constitutes
>>  sexual harrassment."  


    If I being a male, posted this note would it still constitute sexual
    harrassment? If so to which sex?

>>    While Sandy may have intended it to describe
>>    only certain individuals, it was written in such a way as to pertain
>>    to all men: WE men are here to rule in life
                  ^^

	Who made up the rule " When Sandy writes poems she shall always
	write in such a way as to pertain to all men"?



	....
	....
	
>>  I find it somewhat sad that WE will not give to others the rights
				^^
>>  of feelings and beliefs that we expect for ourselves.
    

    Is this written in such a way as to pertain to all womannoters?
    Everyone of us?
    Even ME?

>>  Still a friend.


    You may well be considered a friend depending on how you handle this
    matter with the people involved. You may also be suprised at how forgiving
    this community of women can be.


						Chris

RE: Issues of Free Speech and "Official Policy"     
      
    
These questions/concerns seem to be surfacing more frequently lately,
in this, and some other, Conferences.

References have been made to "official" Network or System P&P's,
vis-a-vis, harassment, free-speech, "misuse of Corporate Assets",
etc.

Some people have been construing that the vague policy statement of
"communication of matters of personal conviction over the Network"
could be used as ammunition against an employee who even sends a "hello"
message to a friend, via VAX-mail.

Does anyone have a feel as to what are legitimate concerns, versus what
borders on paranoia?

Or are the P&P statements deliberately made so vague, so that "selective
enforcement" may be practiced, at a manager's discretion?

  Alan

    Alan, the American ideal of "a government of laws, not of (persons)"
    presupposes concise, objective laws. Does the rule you mentioned
    sound concise and objective to you ? 
    
    I'm not sure I want a concise ruling on what is acceptable in
    Notes, it's likely to be more restrictive than current 'policy'.
    Management seems to 'keep a blind eye handy' re. notes today.
    Whether they continue to do so depends on our good behavior.
    There is no Bill of Rights limiting management interference in
    free noting, we must police ourselves. 
    
    Dana_Who_is_starting_to_sound_like_l'aiglon_:-)

reply from anonymous
=======================================================================
RE: .94
      
>Some people have been construing that the vague policy statement of
>"communication of matters of personal conviction over the Network"
>could be used as ammunition against an employee who even sends a "hello"
>message to a friend, via VAX-mail.

	As the author of .71 I would like to add that the letters which
	got me into trouble, were in fact quite open to misinterpretation.
	Some of them contained jokes of a sexual nature.   I suppose that 
	no one is going to get into trouble for a simple "hello" letter,
	although the wording of the policy statement does not make this
	obvious.

>Or are the P&P statements deliberately made so vague, so that "selective
>enforcement" may be practiced, at a manager's discretion?

	Well, this is the whole problem, as I see it.   The wording *is*
	vague, and that vagueness *will* be used once in a while.   I
	believe that the wording of the current policy *appears* to forbid
	*all* use of editors, mail, or disk space for "matters of private
	conviction or philosophy."    I don't think that most managers
	would bother about private mail and "hello" messages, but others
	might be more strict.

	The freedom of Digital "culture" is still strong, and many managers
	would protect the freedoms we have grown used to.   But that policy 
        statement does not.    I guess it becomes a question of whether we 
	trust all the managers we have to apply that policy wisely.

RE: .95

Dana, no, it sure doesn't sound concise nor objective to me.

And, of course, that's the problem.

It's bad enough when, even in the "real" world, there are explicit
laws on the books from 200 years ago, that almost-always are ignored
by the police or prosecutors. Some people say, "oh why bother getting these
laws removed, NOBODY gets arrested for that anymore". The U.S. Supreme
Court's ruling on Georgia's right of (selective) enforcement of its sodomy 
laws, demonstrates that any no-longer-desired law should be removed from
the statutes. Laws should not be left to personal/political whims.

But a policy like "Digital's networks shall not be used to communicate
matters of personal conviction" is so vague, it's somewhat scary.

Has Policy been broken if I:

  - Send a business message to someone, and close with the phrase
    "Have a nice weekend"?

  - Send a mail message to a Note's contributor, asking him or her
    to clarify a point, or just to say I like the Note?

  - During the Holiday Season, send mail to my co-workers, saying
    "Happy New Year"?

And just because (some) managers might choose to keep a "blind eye",
over what gets written via VAX-mail today, is no indication they'll
continue to be so benevolent in the future.

They don't even have to give anyone prior notice that their philo-
sophy has changed. Nor do they need to be even-handed in their
applications of enforcement.

  Alan   

    Yes, Alan, the selective enforcement is what bothers me.
    
    And the fact that (If I understand the situation correctly)
    *somebody* had to go out of their way to collect The Telltale Evidence.
    Which means, if nobody has a grudge against you, you can write
    anything you want to anybody, but if you have somehow offended someone
    who feels like collecting mail messages and "Tattling" you're in
    the soup. 
    
    I don't like it.
    
    --dE
    

    Re: .98
    
    >if nobody has a grudge against you, you can write anything you
    >want to anybody
    
    Sure.  And anybody on the receiving end can present you with the
    consequences of your actions.
    
    >but if you have somehow offended someone who feels like collecting
    >mail messages and "Tattling"
    
    So how'd they know about the existence of the mail messages unless
    either a sender or a receiver "tattled"?
    
    Of course the rules are subjective.  Management is subjective. 
    There are very few hard-and-fast rules on dealing with people; you're
    usually better off setting up guidelines and evaluating problems
    on a case-by-case basis.

>< Note 738.100 by JENEVR::CHELSEA "Mostly harmless." >
>
>
>    Re: .98
>    
>    >but if you have somehow offended someone who feels like collecting
>    >mail messages and "Tattling"
>    
>    So how'd they know about the existence of the mail messages unless
>    either a sender or a receiver "tattled"?
>    

    The problem  is  that  anyone with privileges can read any file on
    the  system,  including  private  mail.  I  am  aware of two cases
    involving  friends  of  mine (neither took place at Digital) where
    private  mail  was  improperly  read  by  someone  who  it  wasn't
    addressed  to.  These took place at two seperate groups.

    In the first case, a system manager had too much time on his hands
    and  when  he  got  tired of playing adventure, would peruse other
    people's  mail.  

    In the  second,  someone  sent mail to a friend outside the group,
    saying  (among  many other things) that he didn't like the way the
    group  was  being  run (in words not much stronger than that.) The
    mail  bounced,  and  the system manager (who gets all failed mail,
    but  is  only  supposed  to look at it enough to debug the mailer)
    read  it  (this  wasn't  an  accident,  it  was  a long note), and
    forwarded  it  to  his management. The person who sent the message
    was essentially forced to leave.

    I am aquainted with all the people involved in both cases, but not
    personally involved in either.

    DO NOT  ASSUME NOBODY IS READING YOUR MAIL. I have privileges on a
    system here, and can easily read all the mail on it. Since I'm the
    only  user,  that doesn't scare me, but on multi-user systems it's
    always a possibility. I don't trust the system managers at Digital
    more  or  less  than  I  trusted the system managers at the places
    where  the mail was read. I know and trust my system managers, but
    I  don't  know  your system managers, so I have no reason to trust
    them.

--David

	I'm beginning to realize I was really ignorant in posting stuff
    about keeping the notesfile going no matter what.  I thank sincerely
    the people who've posted or told me their personal experiences.
    I don't think we should be paranoid, exactly, but, well, we should
    be aware and interested.  If you've found out that someone's been
    snooping in what you've thought were private areas, be warned that
    it can happen, even here.
    
    I agree with some ephemeral notes here and with the moderators I
    hope, in that we all need to be thoughtful about what we're doing.
    I appreciate this place for its positive things, although I know
    I have several other places for positive women-oriented things,
    I'd like to see Digital retain one like this.

    Re: .101
    
    Did anyone ever complain about the system manager(s?)'s violation
    of company policy?

        As a moderator I have had to work to get an order to shut down
        my employee interest conference rescinded. I have also shut down
        a conference because a member insisted on it. I have refereed
        countless disagreements that ended peaceably. 
        
        As a person who is concerned with the well-being of the company
        I have insisted that statements which I felt had the potential
        to involve DEC in serious legal entanglements be removed from a
        conference, and have even threatened to involve management to
        see this done. 
        
        As a noter I have written at least one note which raised such
        controversy that one person of whom I am extremely fond still
        won't talk to me. 
        
        I have supported a very close friend through the process of
        being formally accused of harassment and put on warning for what
        they wrote in a conference. I've also been directly and
        indirectly involved in discussions leading up to the formulation
        of the current policy on the abuse of DEC's computer resources.
        
        I guess I've been in just about every role there is in this
        ongoing melodrama of what can and can not be said electronically
        at DEC. What I've learned from all of this is that the issues
        are very very complex.
        
        In hopes of shedding some light on this issue, I am posting
        a couple of replies here. They're kinda long. Sorry.

        The first thing to remember is that Notes Conferences on DEC
        equipment have the legal status of "corporate documents". They
        are corporate assests and resources and any use to which they
        are put can be interpretted as an action of the corporation both
        in terms of legal liability and in the eyes of our customers who
        might disapprove of those actions.
        
        This means that Conferences are publications, and aren't subject
        to the freedom of the press or freedom of speech. DEC has every
        right and also the responsibility to control what goes into its
        corporate documents and what use they are put to. Control of the
        contents of notefiles is not censorship. It is the legitimate
        business decision of the owner of a corporate asset.
        
        We don't typically think of condferences in this way. We think
        of them as personal conversations, as publications, or as public
        forums. Unfortunately that's just not what they are, and the
        distinction is very important. What we say here or in any
        conference, because we say it in a corporate document, can be
        taken as having the implicit backing of the corporation unless
        it can be shown that there are corporate policies that expressly
        rule out certain things and that those policies are enforced.
        
        This is why corporate Legal is so concerned with what we say
        about our competitors in notes files, and why people become very
        sensitive about statements that "Dr. So-and-so is a quack". (By
        the way, if you think you can get in hot water for saying
        something that someone thinks is offensive, try really running
        down the competition and let Legal find out about it. They are
        really hot on this topic just now.) 
        
        This doesn't mean that we should abandon electronic conferences.
        It just means that we have to understand the context in which
        they reside. What we say reflects not merely on us individually,
        but on DEC as a corporation. To make it worse, we are an
        extremely international corporation, and the laws of dozens of
        countries apply to DEC and our network. Additionally, our
        customers come from many many cultures and can find a very wide
        range of corporate activities offensive or unacceptable. 
        
        JimB.

        As it happens, I know what the original intent of the language
        about "communicating matters of personal conviction or
        philosophy" in the P&P manual was. There were, as far as I know,
        two factors involved. First, it seems that someone at DEC was on
        the receiveing end of some very high pressure proseltyzing by a
        religious group using electronic mail. They felt deeply coerced
        and since it was DEC's resources that were being used, it seems
        that many people felt DEC had some legal exposure. 
        
        The second issue is the question of DEC resources being used to
        organize or affect controversial social change. This issue
        actually comes up in this conference every now and then, when
        issues such as advertising political fund raisers arise. It is
        not to DEC's interest to have it become known that corporate
        resources have been used to the benefit of some cause with which
        some of our customers disagree. DEC prefers to do business
        without taking sides on a very large range of social and
        political issues. Use of corporate resources for the advancing
        of causes not sponsered by DEC can give the impression of
        corportate backing.
        
        Those two issues are what prompted the statement that using
        corporate resources to "communicate matters of personal
        conviction or philosophy" is an EXEAMPLE of something that MIGHT
        be considered an abuse. Please note that the policy does NOT
        state that such communication IS an abuse.
        
        Unfortunately, middle managers are not notorious for their deep
        understanding of the intent of policies, as opposed to the blind
        enforcmenet of what they think of as direct policy dictates of
        the higher ups. While our upper management is very big on
        principles, on "doing the right thing", and on the spirit of the
        law rather than its letter, a lot of people who are in middle
        management will never get any higher than middle management
        because they don't understand anything but bureaucracy, and have
        neither the wit nor the imagination to rise to top management or
        to be effective as creative contributors. 
        
        You will therefore find the example of possible abuse used as if
        it were itself policy. You will also find it in combination with
        demands that you ask no questions and assertions that the open
        door policy doesn't apply here. The problem is for the most part
        not the infalicitous wording of the policy. It's the with the
        fact that the Peter Principle is very strongly reflected at the
        low end of middle management.
        
        In actual fact, the policy as enforced in most places in the
        corporation, and as I believe it would be enforced if you
        pressed the issue to upper management is this. You cannot
        express matters of personal conviction or philosophy if you do
        it in a way that is harassing. You may not use high pressure or
        coercive proselytizing. You may not organize or affect
        controversial social change. You MAY express your philosophy and
        convictions as a part of the process of Valuing Differences. The
        company actively supports its employees in learning about each
        other and the varieties of background, experienece and
        viewpoints that we have. 
        
        JimB.

        One thing that seems kind of ominous in the earlier notes in
        this discussion is the process of handling complaints of
        harassment and offensiveness at DEC. A couple of people have
        raised the issue of "due process" and the like. Having observed
        this process in action, let me see if I can explain how it works
        and why. 
        
        What you have to understand as background for this is the
        definition of harassment in our legal system. Actually, before
        that you have to understand that there is no single "our" legal
        system for DEC. Within the US there is Federal law, 50 states,
        and zillions of local communities all with their own laws. Since
        our net spans several continents and dozens of countries, the US
        diversity is only a small part of the puzzle. Therefore things
        like the "legal definition of harassment" are actually hopeless
        generalizations.
        
        The hopeless generalization that I've learned is that it is
        harassment if you persist in offensive behavior after being
        informed that it is offensive and requested to cease. This can
        mean as little as two offenses, one before the warning and one
        after. This is where the problem comes for DEC. The company
        can't really be involved BEFORE the first occurrence but if
        there is even one more occurrence after DEC has become involved,
        there may be legal grounds for complaint, and DEC could easily
        end up being involved.
        
        The worst case for DEC would be if a person complained to DEC
        about being subjected to offensive behavior, and the company
        decided that it wan't really offenseive and took no action, only
        to have the offense repeated and then formally recognized as
        harassment by a court of law. In that case, DEC could readily be
        held liable for doing nothing about it.
        
        This means that if DEC receives a complaint that someone is
        being harassed, it has to take the complaint seriously, inform
        the offender, order them to stop and take some documentable
        action to see that it does in fact stop. The process that it
        uses is to put you on warning, to tell you to have nothing to do
        with the complainer or risk being fired, and to record this in a
        way that Legal can demonstrate later. 
        
        The fact that such charges are subjected to very little critical
        review is the explanation of why the record of this process
        becomes a very restricted part of your record, accessable only
        by you, Legal, and enough of Personnel to be able to find it.
        Legal has to have access if there is a court fight. You have to
        have access for reasons of privacy. But if anyone else is
        allowed to see this and the charge is unfounded, the company
        would be in trouble again. 
        
        Another thing explained by all of this is why not only this
        conference but the corporation has a policy of not revealing the
        names of the people who complain of harassment. Publicizing the
        offensive event or pointing out who the person complaining of
        harassment is can be viewed as a form of harassment in and of
        itself. If the person has a legitimate complaint (and only the
        courts can actually determine THAT) and they are held up to
        public ridicule for complaining then whoever contributed to the
        publicizing of the complaint is very likely to be considered a
        participant in the harassment.
        
        JimB. 

    Re .104-.107

    It would appear, then, that there was no reason to hide or delete
    Sandy's poem.  It was an expression of opinion well within the
    intent, at least, of the "valuing differences" guidelines.  If the
    complainant insisted on going to Personnel, someone there should have
    explained the guidelines to him.  If for some reason the local
    Personnel department misinterpreted the guidelines and refused to be
    enlightened, the notesfile could be moved to a node in a Personnel 
    jurisdiction in which the intent of the guidelines was understood.

    Is that true?

    - Cliff

    re: < Note 738.108 by MEIS::ZIMMERMAN "All natural ingredients" >

    Hi Cliff - I didn't know you noted here...
    
�    It would appear, then, that there was no reason to hide or delete
�    Sandy's poem.  It was an expression of opinion well within the
�    intent, at least, of the "valuing differences" guidelines.
    
    	What JimB's note said is that DEC (and in this case the moderators
    are representing DEC) must respond to a complaint - hiding the note is 
    response.
    
�    					... If for some reason the local
�    Personnel department misinterpreted the guidelines and refused to be
�    enlightened, the notesfile could be moved to a node in a Personnel 
�    jurisdiction in which the intent of the guidelines was understood.
    
    	Do you believe this is realistic?  What this paragraph says to me
    is that you would want to move this conference to personnel and
    let them determine what is harrasment.  You'd rather have someone
    complain directly to personnel when they don't like your note rather
    than work it out at the noters level?
    
    --Doug_who's_taking_mild_heat_in_ASKENET_for_some_moderator_decisions
    

        Who says noting doesn't pay off. Since writing 738.104, I've
        been in touch with the person I said was no longer talking to me
        and we've patched up any misunderstanding that still existed. It
        seems, by the way, that they were somewhat surprised to learn
        that I had interpreted the silence that had passed between us as
        intentional. 
        
        JimB. 

        It has come to my attention that besides the occasional typo
        and spelling error, 738.105 contains a significantly omitted
        "not". The statement that,
            
            "This means that Conferences are publications, and
            aren't subject to the freedom of the press or freedom of
            speech."
        
        should have read, 
            
            "This means that Conferences are NOT publications, and
            aren't subject to the freedom of the press or freedom of
            speech."
        
        Sorry 'bout that. S'what happens when you note hastily late
        at night.
        
        JimB.

>< Note 738.103 by JENEVR::CHELSEA "Mostly harmless." >
>
>
>    Re: .101
>    
>    Did anyone ever complain about the system manager(s?)'s violation
>    of company policy?

    Neither incident  I  described took place at Digital. In the first
    case  (reading  mail  but  taking  no action) very few people knew
    about  it  and  no  action  was  taken.  In the second (leading to
    someone's  forced  resignation)  at  least one level of management
    didn't  like  the  person and the system manager was brown-nosing.
    Many  people  complained  ineffectually,  but I don't think anyone
    went  up  the  management  chain.  Neither  place had an open door
    policy, and neither place had published rules on the matter.

--David

        RE: 738.108
        
        I'm afraid that you are only considering part of what I wrote
        in my little dissertation. Given the length of what I wrote,
        this is quite understandable. Let me see if I can put the
        current situation into the larger context of my understanding of
        how policy and law affect noting. 
        
        In a conference such as this which is formally or informally
        serving the goals of Valuing Differences, it is reasonable to
        allow things to be said that would be unacceptable in other
        contexts, providing *that*no*one*complains*. So long as there is
        a policy of what is acceptable and what is not (which this
        conference has), and there is clear evidence that it is enforced
        (which there is), the moderators can assure DEC's policy makers,
        and DEC can assure the legal system, that due care has been
        taken.
        
        On the other hand, once somebody does complain that something
        constitutes harassment, the moderators are bound to take some
        kind of action, just as Personnel are required to take any
        complaints that it receives seriously, and for essentially the
        same reason. It is important that complaints of harassment not
        go unheeded. DEC may condone some amount of controversial
        expression, but it must not condone harassment.
        
        The legal system will not deal gently with DEC if DEC condones
        harassment, and DEC will not deal gently with a conference that
        condones harassment, even in the name of Valuing Differences.
        And remember, the only way something can be definitively be
        determined to be harassment is through the courts, an event that
        DEC would prefer not to see, regardless of the outcome. 
        
        Given all of this, the moderators have done precisely what they
        must. If someone complained that Sandy's poem constituted
        harassment, they HAD to take some action. The generally accepted
        course is to hide the note and either put the two people in
        contact or act as an intermediate between them, in the hope that
        the complainant will withdraw the complaint or the author
        revises the note to make it acceptable. 
        
        Sending the complaint on to Personnel, and thus admitting that
        the WomanNotes community and moderators can't handle the
        situation, should only be done as a final resort. Inviting the
        attention and scrutiny of DEC's formal channels means that they
        have to be sure that if the problem isn't solved at their level
        they can demonstrate to the legal system that hey took all due
        precautions. That may mean that they have to review the other
        contents of the conference to make sure there is no pattern of
        harassment, and if there *appears* to be, they may have to take
        corrective action. 
        
        As an example, a year or two ago there was a complaint about a
        note in Human-Relations. In the course of investigating the
        complaint, Personnel and management came across a discussion
        that the moderators had ruled was marginal, but acceptable.
        While they agreed that that was a reasonable judgment call,
        their view was that that entire discussion, which was not
        related to the note that was complained about, was entirely
        unacceptable. As a result, the discussion and a handful of other
        notes had to be deleted, and the rules of the conference
        tightened up.
        
        JimB. 

        Having the Valuing Differences folk ersolve all conflicts is
        certainly a legitimate way to run a Valuing Differences
        conference. The question is what would be the effects of running
        things this way?
        
        Personally, I don't think I'd like to see the conference run
        with as conservative a hand as it would have to be if be if any
        branch of DEC's formal organization were to be explicitly
        responsible for the contents of the conference. As it stands
        today, the occasional overlooked indiscrete note can be forgiven
        as the moderation is done on an unofficial part time basis.
        
        But what a couple of men think about how the conference should
        be run is not nearly so important as what the community as a
        whole, and the moderators (who are answerable to their
        management and to the policy making and enforcing parts of the
        company) think. Somehow, I don't see this conference abandoning
        its rule by consensus to the gentle offices even of DEC's most
        enlightened bureaucracy.
        
        JimB. 

    In reference to an earlier note...note 309 in the Human::Digital
    conference discusses the issue of mail privacy.

    
    	Why do notes files have to be regarded as the documents of Digital
    corporation rather than as the personal discussions that they actually
    are?    Is there a way to relieve Digital as a corporation from
    the liability for what is expressed here?    It seems to me that
    this perception of potential legal liability greatly increases the 
    problems that moderators face, and is the main factor here restricting 
    our "freedom of speech".
    
    			Alan.

re:. - 1

If you look at this strictly, Notes conferences are
	- run by Digital employees
	- maintained on Digital-owned computers and discs
	- accessed over Digital's internal proprietary network (EASYnet)
	- acknowledged by (and encouraged by) various levels of management

 How can we get Digital out of the loop?

 Move notesfiles onto systems not owned by Digital which are not directly
accessible from the EASYnet (that is, turn the notes conferences into 
something like the USENET or ARPAnet news-groups).

    RE:  738.118
    
    > Why do notes files have to be regarded as the documents of Digital
      corporation rather than as the personal discussions that they
      actually are?
    
    As it has been mentioned before, DEC owns the equipment and the
    network that the notes are on.  If they own and operate the network
    then they have the liability also.
    
    Pat

>    Is there a way to relieve Digital as a corporation from
>    the liability for what is expressed here?    

    Sure - buy your ["you" = whoever wants to implement this divestiture
    of liability] own computer to host the conference, install it
    someplace other than DEC property, arrange for the dialin lines,
    etc. 

    What happens when the act of deletion or the request for deletion
    is in itself viewed as an instance of harassment?

    I think that's covered by that phrase about requests from persons
    of known reputation (don't remember the exact words). Moderators
    are not required to delete at request of known ummm..."undesirables"

    

    Dana is correct. As moderators we have to make a judgement call
    on the reasons why a person is complaining. We have received complaints
    in the past where we decided that the person was ~/~ and acted
    accordingly.
    
    Bonnie Jeanne

        What happens if someone tries to use or is perceived to be using
        the system as a form of harassment? It gets very complicated
        very fast. With luck, a good moderator can defuse the situation
        with only a moderate amount of pain. Fortunately, most people
        really aren't intentionally causing trouble, and if you point
        out to them politely what the effects of their actions are or
        how they are perceived they will try to improve the situation.
        When faced with folk who just refuse to play the game, though,
        the moderator seldom has much choice but to go the formal route.
        If Personnel doesn't find a cut and dried case in one direction
        or the other and can't get the two people to back down, then it
        is likely that they will both be warned to stay away from each
        other.
        
        JimB.

    Maybe we could take a lesson from Harry Anderson et al and open
    our own "Note Court"!  Think of the possibilities.  Laroquette would
    make a great prosecuting attorney but I want Marsha Warfield for
    the defense!  ;-)

    In that vein, I wonder what the chances are of seeing Ken Olsen
    hauled up before Judge Stone on charges of abetting harrassment? 
    Fear of being sued seems to be the prime motivator behind Digital's
    policies in this area, but how great is the company's exposure
    really?  I don't follow court cases like this, but the ones I recall
    were either serious EEO abuses that had usually occurred over a
    period of time - like the situation described in note 740 - or else
    were totally inane, like the one that determined that "Welcome to
    ..." messages before login could be construed to be an invitation to
    hackers to come on in and browse around.

    No one wants to invite litigation, of course, but how many times have
    companies been sued and lost because of a comment in a notesfile or
    the like? 

    - Cliff

    I don't even think we should think THAT far ahead.  Behaving in
    notes should not be because DEC might get sued, but because WE may
    be risking loosing our jobs which I dare say might happen before
    or instead of any lawsuit.  You don't have to loose a court case
    to get fired or not get hired - you just have to have a bad rep.
    
    If things ever got far enough that litigation was imminent I'm sure
    the reputations and the working environments of the parties involved 
    will have already suffered beyond repair.
    
    The law is one thing, but perception is EVERYTHING.  I would not
    go out on a limb to prove a point here in notes even if I were as
    right as rain.  When you agree to work here you do it for your paycheck
    and NOT for a forum to exercise your constitutional rights in any
    way you see fit.  You can't come in to my house and swear and slander
    and engage in "free speech" if I don't like it and you can't do it in 
    DEC's house either.  Constitutional rights have nothing to do with
    it.  Ken makes the rules under his roof.  (Thanx Dad, I knew that
    hated phrase would come in handy sooner or later!  ;-)     )

        PLease! There is nothing at all clandestined about the existence
        of WomanNotes or Human-Relations or any of the other Employee
        Activity conferences. They are legitimate employee activities
        and appropriate uses of DEC resources done with the consent and
        knowledge of management, Personnel, and other policy making
        parts of the corporation.
        
        I can't speak for the WomanNotes moderators, but I can assure
        you that my management, up to the vice presidential level, not
        only is aware of but supports my Notes moderating activities. My
        VP has expressed his support for our conferences, has given
        explicit permission for their existence, has supported the
        existence of the rules which govern our conferences and the
        manner in which some of us have carried out that responsibility.
        My own manager has explicitly stated that while moderating
        Employee Activity conferences in not a requirement of my job,
        that my participation and the responsibility with which I do the
        job of moderator is taken as a positive asset in my review.
        
        The manner in which conferences such as WomanNotes, Human_
        Relations, Philosophy and the like are handled may be informal,
        but it is not clandestined. In fact, it is precisely in keeping
        with the standard DEC policy that decisions ought to be made at
        the lowests level possible. In the context of electronic
        conferences that means that first the participants should
        attempt to resolve their difficulties on their own, if they
        can't the issues should escalate up through the levels--
        moderators, local management, personnel, upper management, etc.
        
        Formal management by Valuing Differences sponsors, local or
        corporate personnel or the like is not more legitimate. It is in
        fact foreign to the main thrust of DEC policy and style.
        
        JimB.

    re: .118-.124 (more/less)
    
    In the case of DEC equipment. The laws of our land have become so
    convoluted regarding liabilities that even when DEC does "public
    service" and "generous favors" for  the benefit of others; we (as
    a corporation become liable for any negative outcomes of that
    generosity. If you'll remeber the "Cow and Fence" incident. Basically,
    DEC let a farmer graze cows ona oiece of vacant land. The cow
    passed though an old fence, and a car struck the cow. DEC was liable
    because (according to the "Deep Pockets" theory) DEC owned  the
    land.
    
    It is BECAUSE DEC OWNS this "Business" equipment that it (the
    conferences) must abide by the rules which will protect DEC from
    liabelous actions.
    
    Regarding the Arpanet andUSEnet. ABout a year or so ago they went
    through the same sort of thing that drove "SEXCETERA" off the network.
    Again, those networks are owned by business activiities,and they
    don't either the liability nor the "data choking" of their resources
    getting bogged down with "trivial pap" (non business related
    activites).
    
    The "magic" 800 numbers with the jokes, dates, smut, and whatever
    are also coming under fire from the regulators, in that "purveyors"
    of the things "some" people find objectinable, must be conducted
    in such a maner as to prevent "minors" from using those services.
    
    If you are alluding to these networks, then hopefully people are
    also READING about these issues. There are a LOT of taxpayers/ voters
    who are convicing their elected leaders that our right to "freedom
    of speech" needsd to be controlled to exclude topics deemed to be
    unfit for their children.
    
    Recently (in England) a type of telephone service was shut down
    based oin this very issue. The expense of controlling access to
    it was so high that theyc chose to close down rather than incur
    the wrath of their own regulators.
    
    Its very strange (in one sense) to talk about freedom of speech
    on a business system, unless one also talks about protecting that
    freedom.
    
    Yes, if you  have a computer, you can get a "Fido" package and install
    your own "Bulletin Board", and do anything you darn well please
    (until the regulators make YOU an offer you can't refuse).
    
    I think we're lucky to have as much freedom as we do here. WE get
    by with a lot, and we can still learn a lot. But, like the people
    who "own" this network, if you come to my house I will expect you
    to act in certain manner. If you get obnoxious, then I'll ask you
    to leave. Taken in this context, the DECnet rules are simple:
    Don't make life difficult for DEC. There's lots of people
    who'd love to have a "free  and open discussion" ... about 
    anything ...... But, the reality is, the same people who have
    created laws about EEO, Womans Rights, Employee Rights, have also
    defined a "code of ethics" for businesses, which the businesses
    must enforce ... fairly.

    Bob