https://bugs.freebsd.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=288064
Edward Tomasz Napierala <[email protected]> changed: What |Removed |Added ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- CC| |[email protected] --- Comment #19 from Edward Tomasz Napierala <[email protected]> --- So, at this point I suppose everyone knows the gist - zio trolls asked core@ to kick me out for protesting genocide, and core@ was surprisingly eager to comply - but the core's account might be useful for future reference. It's not entirely accurate (for example core never tried to contact me, wonder why), but it's better than nothing, so for the sake of transparency here goes: Hi, This is an official email from core@, prepared by glebius@ and solicited with all active members. With this email we aim to provide maximum transparency on the timeline, explain core actions and intentions. There is no further disclosure that core@ can do. 22 May 2025 lwhsu@ get’s notification from someone about the FreeBSD project getting linked to the ongoing Twitter/X scandal on supposedly antisemitic statements by trasz@. Actual link: https://x.com/diegodazan/status/1924832433381179635 Active core members at the moment lwhsu@, dch@, olivier@ agree that no action needs to be taken. The statement “Free Palestine, fuck Israel!” is discovered on trasz@’s page on wiki.freebsd.org. Note: the statement was added 22nd April 2025, but was not noticed before. dch@ suggests that core@ needs to request a revert from Edward. olivier@ agrees. However, no email is sent to trasz@. 29 May 2025 olivier@ sends email to linimon@ (he is wiki admin) with a request to delete the statement. 30 May 2025 09:46 +0000 linimon@ replies with email that has following important points: * linimon@ remembers that ~6 months before the statement was already there and he asked trasz@ to remove it in a personal email. The request was honored back then, but today the statement is back. * linimon@ notes that there is no exactly codified rule in CoC that disallows political content. * linimon@ asks if core@ has asked trasz@ to remove the content himself. * linimon@ asks if the decision was deliberately discussed internally with all of the core@. He will politely object if it was not. 20:19 +0000 A non-project member emails [email protected] asking if trasz@’s wiki page is consistent with the project’s CoC 20:45 +0000 allanjude@ edits trasz@’s page and removes the statement. Today’s comment from glebius@: my later discussions with core@ members give me the impression that the quick removal of the content on 30th May was done with the best intent to avoid the shitstorm that was already ongoing on Twitter/X to flame up more with the statement still hanging on the project wiki. This action may actually have had a certain positive effect - we don’t know what would happen if the content stayed. Also, at that moment the core@’s assumption was that trasz@ actually does not want to mix FreeBSD project into the scandal. 2 June 2025 The core@ has a video conference, attendees: allanjude@, dch@, lwhsu@, mat@, olivier@. The minutes of the meeting aren’t very detailed, but two facts can be extracted: * Attendees appreciate and agree with wise email from linimon@. * There is an opinion that not informing trasz@ of the wiki content removal is better than the opposite. It is unclear whether this opinion was supported by the majority of attendees. 16 June 2025 The core has a video conference, attendees: dch@, hrs@, lwhsu@, mat@, olivier@. The attendees consider the trasz@’s issue solved and done. 4 July 2025 trasz@ discovers that his wiki page was edited and puts the statement back. Five minutes later he changes it to a new version: “Israel is an apartheid state committing genocide, and it's everyone's moral responsibility to fight it. Free Palestine!”. linimon@ forwards this information to core@. dch@ and olivier@ start a discussion if we need to extend to CoC to forbid political statements in the FreeBSD space or instead of inventing a new rule after every incident just act ad hoc, and in this particular case ask trasz@ to remove the content. 6 July 2025 A bug report is filed in bugzilla: https://bugs.freebsd.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=288064 Today’s comment from glebius@: apparently a new round of shitstorm appears outside of the FreeBSD space, but core sees only remote echoes of that :( 7 July 2025 dch@ discovers that core@ has not actually sent an email to trasz@ back in May about his page being edited. mat@ confirms that indeed that was missed. 11 July 2025 Bryan Lunduke (a podcaster/video blogger on Linux and related stuff) sends email to core@ and to the FreeBSD foundation requesting any response and/or comments on bug 288064. He threatens to give the project 5 hours before he publishes a story. glebius@ deletes the content from trasz@’s wiki page and writes a reply to Lunduke with the following statements: * We don’t appreciate your intimidating tone. * core@ is aware of the problem, but we wanted trasz@ to delete content himself instead of entering vicious circle of wiki edit war. * Because of your threats I’m deleting content now, but threatening will not work for a second time. At the same time dch@ independently replies to Bryan Lunduke. He coordinates his reply with Anne from the FreeBSD Foundation. dch@ reply is more polite and apologizing than glebius@’s but reiterates the same points. Bryan Lunduke replies to both emails from glebius@ and dch@ thanking for the input and asking for more comments/contents so that he can include them in his blogging. Today’s note from glebius@: when writing my reply I totally missed the fact that core@ never informed trasz@ of the wiki page edits, yet. My incorrect assumption was that we followed the standard reversion process: first ask the committer to revert, try to convince them and only if they refuse proceed with administrative reverting action. 12 July 2025 dch@ writes email to trasz@ notifying him that core@ has again edited his wiki page and that his wiki account is suspended. 14 July 2025 The core has a video conference, attendees: dch@, lwhsu@, allanjude@, glebius@, hrs@. The entire meeting is dedicated to trasz@ incident. Discussion points: * Should the entire wiki page be deleted with history? The agreement is that trying to cover up doesn't make sense as this is part of history and the screenshot is already out in Lunduke's article and also it is complicated. * Should trasz@ commit privileges be suspended? The agreement was not reached and the decision was to create a vote. * Should we make any public statements, etc? The agreement was that we should not and also don’t reply to any Lunduke-like inquiries. * Discussed any possible points of improving relations with trasz@, e.g. contacting him via people who know him personally, e.g. his colleagues from Cambridge. 16 July 2025 Per core@ discussion on 14th of July dch@ creates a vote to suspend trasz@. 18 July 2025 trasz@ sends email to core@ noting that he learned from Lunduke’s podcast that the core@ told him that core@ had asked him to remove the content. But this is a lie, as core@ never did that. trasz@ threatens the core@ with forwarding all email communication with core@ to Lunduke. glebius@ replies to trasz@ explaining that glebius@’s assumption that trasz@ was previously asked to remove the content himself was incorrect, and thus reply to Lunduke had a factual mistake. glebius@ apologies for the mistake. glebius@ also asks trasz@ to cooperate with undoing any harm to the FreeBSD projects and asks not to feed Lunduke with more content. trasz@ replies asking why did not the normal process of asking for reversion of content happen. He asks to debug that problem. The second question from trasz@ is whether our CoC is inline with reality, meaning if any political content is disallowed in the FreeBSD space why isn’t this rule explicitly listed in CoC? Meanwhile the vote on suspension results in a tie: 3 yes, 3 no. 20 July 2025 rene@ publishes May core@ report to developers@. Message-ID: <[email protected]> 28 July 2025 The core has a video conference, attendees: allanjude@, hrs@, glebius@, lwhsu@, mat@. Two decisions made: * Wait for olivier@ to return from vacation to resolve the tie in the vote. * glebius@ to compose reply to trasz@ to answer his questions from 18th July email and solicit this reply with the rest of core@. glebius@ also promises to get involved into private communication with trasz@ to try to calm him down. olivier@ returns from vacation and resolves the vote. Vote results: Vote on [conduct] trasz@ suspension. Yes: allanjude, dch, mat No: glebius, hrs, lwhsu, olivier Abstained: Did not vote: tcberner trasz@ writes email to core@ reminding that he is awaiting for answers on his questions. The email also has a threatening tone, e.g. trasz@ says he also won’t be updating core@ on his plans anymore. 29-31 July 2025 glebius@ is involved in two email threads with trasz@, one is private and the second with core@ in Cc. glebius@: In my personal opinion, this all communication was fruitless pounding of water in a mortar (English: beating the air). I grant the right to trasz@ to disclose all these communications to developers@ or to the public. I don’t see the point in bringing this communication to this report, since we didn’t reach any agreement nor any progress. 31 July 2025 The reply from core@ to trasz@ is solicited and emailed to him. The core@’s two statements from this email are copied verbatim into this report. 1. Answering the question on why his wiki was edited silently instead of asking to revert: This happened due to several members of core@ being offline when the issue emerged. Remaining members acted in their own discretion motivated by the goal to keep the project safe from any political scandals. In retrospect we see that silently deleting content instead of asking the originator to delete it themselves is always a wrong strategy. Please believe me, we debugged that quite thoroughly in the following core@ discussions and we will try our best for such a thing to not happen in the future. Please accept our apologies. 2. Answering the question on what part of CoC did you use to remove my content: This actually is not a matter of Code of Conduct. The CoC codifies how we communicate with each other in the project: in emails, in git logs, in bugzilla & phabricator. Your political manifesto on the wiki is not a one-to-one message, nor is it targeting any specific project member. The CoC basically doesn’t cover that. As for now we do not have any written rule that forbids political content on project resources. For most of us it is just an obvious thing to use the project resources for technical contributions to the project. But all conflicts in the projects are resolved by core@ and with this one, core@ unanimously thinks that political content shall not be posted on public project resources. This is the same resolution as for previous similar reports to core@. This may or may not become a published rule later. 6 August 2025 trasz@ replies on rene@’s email with the May Core report, asking when can we expect the proper, uncensored version of this report. The message is Cc’d to developers@. Message-Id: <[email protected]> 25 August 2025 gerald@ replies to trasz@ email from 6th of August asking what this refers to. The message is Cc’d to developers@. Message-ID: <[email protected]> 8 September 2025 trasz@ replies to gerald@. The message is Cc’d to developers@, Message-Id: <[email protected]> The rest of communications is all on developers@. -- Gleb Smirnoff -- You are receiving this mail because: You are on the CC list for the bug.
