I am not sure in what sense the user is using that photo and I am not trying to defend the use in any case.
I just want to say that from the name of the person I am guessing that he actually might actually be unaware of the impact and using it in a different sense. "Swastika" is a very common symbol in India and is found in a lot of houses and by default is viewed as a Hindu symbol and considered auspicious. It is often in shades of red but I have never seen one with red and black as black is considered inauspicious. It is not common in India to find a person who is unaware of the impact. I think we should give the benefit of doubt to the person and assume the best of their intentions. However, given the connotations of the symbol and the more common connotation of the symbol, I would recommend avoiding it. My 2 cents. Regards Ajay Yadava On Tue, Jan 31, 2017 at 6:50 PM Ted Dunning <ted.dunn...@gmail.com> wrote: > Yeah... I twitched when I saw that. > > My suspicion is that this is being used in the ancient, pre-nazi sense. > > It is hard to believe that somebody is ignorant of the impact it must have > on some readers. > > > > On Tue, Jan 31, 2017 at 3:47 PM, Christopher <ctubb...@apache.org> wrote: > > > Hi all, > > > > It is surprising to me that a certain individual participant in ASF > forums > > seems to be using a swastika as their Google profile photo. The impact of > > this is that ASF users which use GMail to interact with the mailing > lists, > > are presented with this swastika whenever reading or interacting with ASF > > forums using GMail. > > > > To be clear, this symbol can have alternate meanings, and it may not be > > intentionally being used as Nazi symbol. Additionally, even if this > > individual holds to certain ideologies which may be antithetical to ASF > > community inclusive values, they may act entirely professional and in > > accordance with ASF code of conduct on Apache forums. So, I don't want to > > imply that the profile photo is indicative of their ASF interactions... > it > > may be an entirely separate thing. > > > > My main inquiry here is to question whether or not there is a concern, > > because the use of such profile photos may actually have consequences of > > deterring potential new committers, because Apache may be indicted by > > association. > > > > Is there something we wish to do about this? Is it a non-issue? I really > > don't know. All I know, is my gut tells me that I'm bothered when I see > it > > (I use GMail). But, I don't want to overreact, or start a witch hunt. I'm > > genuinely curious if this is something we want to address at all. > > > > If the profile photo is used on ASF infrastructure (JIRA, affiliated as a > > member of the Apache org on GitHub, etc.), then I think we probably do > want > > to address it in the Code of Conduct. However, unrelated services like > > Google profile photos... that may not be something we want to address, > > because the web mail client users use is not related to ASF services > (even > > if it were know for user that it impacted ASF community by deterring > > potential new community members). > > > > In any case, I don't raise this issue to demean the individual whose > > profile photo came to my attention... this is not an attack on them. > Again, > > this is not a witch hunt. > > -- > > Christopher > > > -- Regards Ajay Yadava
