On Fri, May 22, 2015 at 5:52 PM, Ehsan Akhgari <[email protected]>
wrote:

> On 2015-05-22 7:38 PM, Adam Roach wrote:
>
>> On 5/22/15 17:59, Mike Connor wrote:
>>
>>> Can you name an example that would actually be widely controversial?
>>>
>>
>> Perhaps the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic -- I'd have to brush up on
>> Moroccan politics to be sure.
>>
>
> OK, so let's say that someone living in that region wants to be identified
> as living in SADR.  Why is that not OK?  And why is it up to us to decide
> that?  And why would Mozilla care if the said individual wants to be
> identified as living in the SADR or in Morocco?
>
>  If not, I don't think this is a material concern.
>>>
>>
>> Can you predict the entire worldwide political landscape for the rest of
>> the lifetime of the project?
>>
>
> Nobody can, but what is the point of this question?
>
>  There are some very plausible, very near-term futures where an alternate
>> government that currently controls parts of what are widely recognized
>> as Iraq, Syria, Libya, and Nigeria begins to establish diplomatic
>> relations with other countries. It isn't hard to believe that, much like
>> the gradual diplomatic acceptance of the PRC in the '50's and '60's,
>> such an entity might gain recognition by a non-trivial percentage of UN
>> member states.
>>
>> And that? That would be controversial.
>>
>
> It seems like you're optimizing for a different goal than some others in
> this thread: avoiding making controversial decisions, and your solution is
> to hand that off to another organization (the ISO.)
>
> Let me just talk about one of the most controversial cases for a second:
> ISIL, since you've mentioned it up-thread.  Let's say that there are people
> who self-identify as ISIL citizens, and they would like to be part of the
> Mozilla community.  What is the harm in allowing that individual to
> self-identify as such for the purposes of their Mozilla contributions?
>
> I think this debate simply boils down to what goal we're trying to achieve
> here.  If our goal is avoiding controversy at all costs, then your
> suggestion makes sense.  But I would like to suggest that our goal should
> be building a strong community that is open and welcoming to all, no matter
> which part of the world they were born in, and live in, and how they
> identify where in the world they live.  With that goal in mind, off-loading
> this decision to ISO makes no sense, since that is effectively Mozilla
> taking a stance on what is and is not a country, and taking away the
> ability of our contributors to make this call.
>

Well, it's worth noting that this thread started (going on two weeks ago
now) when someone complained about someone else using "Prishtina - Kosovo -
Albania" as their location. I suspect that the person complaining didn't
feel like we were fostering a welcoming environment.

-Ekr
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