More importantly than morality issues Debian needs to consider legal
issues. I have no idea whether a CoC or GR is needed but if such an GR
is put to the vote legal constraints cannot be ignored.
Am 21.07.25 um 20:05 schrieb Lucas Nussbaum:
On 21/07/25 at 19:22 +0200, Wouter Verhelst wrote:
I can think of a few more examples that caused controversies in in the
past:
- A system load monitor, about 20 years ago, that used a cartoon of a
lady who was progressively undressed as the computer got warmer.
It was named 'hot-babe'.
Those themes for hot-babe could serve as test data points for a policy
on the content of packages: http://caca.zoy.org/wiki/hot-babe
- A toolkit called "weboob" (for "WEB Outside Of Browser") that had
devolved into a bunch of juvenile boob jokes
#906119, #907199
I vaguely remember a mailing list discussion about distributing a game
with child-porn elements - that was considered fine by some but is
strongly illegal in lots of jurisdictions. Luckily it never made it into
Debian.
I *also* think that it's not a problem if software in Debian does such
things optionally, if explicitly enabled. But perhaps not everyone
agrees with that, and that's fine.
The line is difficult to draw: fortunes-*-off, hot-babe or weboob
are/were optional in Debian (as in no user is forced to install them,
and they probably don't/didn't have reverse-depends). So it would be OK
to keep them in Debian?
Debian has a responsibility regarding their mirrors to not make them
inadvertendly distribute punishable material, even if optional. In some
jurisdictions this also involves historical quotes if not put into a
scientific historical context. Keeping them optional will not help the
mirror in case it gets under scrutiny.
I know that what different jurisdictions see as punishable offense
differs wildly around the world. But there is at least some agreement in
a majority of jurisdiction about what never goes and about what only
goes from a certain age. Remember that distributing inappropriate
material to minors is also punishable in some (most?) jurisdictions. And
Debian does not do age verification. This means that at least the user
interaction of every package needs to stay on the "appropriate for
children"-side. No matter whether optional or not.
I haven't looked at fortune-off but if it contains porn, violence or
quotes of certain historical figures without appropriate context (I'm
not talking about DDs here), it needs to leave Debian.
Enforced age verification might cause problems for some games which does
not sit well with me and might need further discussion if legislation
goes as planned by the EU. But even games in Debian should have their
limits (as in the example mentioned above).
In any case user interaction can be required to respect the laws and
whenever anybody feels the need to present material to the user that is
known to be illegal in many jurisdictions it should not be distributed
by Debian. At the very least in order to protect our mirrors.
