ONAP Community, We experienced an act of violence earlier today. Our TSC meeting was interrupted with violent racial and homophobic slurs. Our community was violated with bigory and an intent to harm. Our values and our ability to feel safe when we have strong and respectful debates was damaged. And we were harmed in the context of this year in which much of how we live and how we interact has been shattered. It was not ok.
Many of us might be feeling embarrassment, shame, horror, and disbelief. These are reasonable and appropriate reactions: we had thought ourselves safe from this sort of violence because we have been striving towards creating an inclusive and non-violent community. On the back-end Linux Foundation IT is taking steps to protect all of us from these intrusions, but in the meantime we understand that many of you may need resources to process what happened. We have created a page in the ONAP wiki: https://wiki.onap.org/x/Qv8LBQ This is a place for everyone to share their raw reactions and to ask comfort from the community. Additionally, the LF is making available trauma-informed counseling resources available. We are still working through some of the logistics, and I will follow up tomorrow, but Jim Zemlin allocated money this morning to ensure that every single person in our community can connect with a professional in the wake of this terrifying experience. I want to also express a hard truth that is not at all meant to reduce anyone’s reaction to this violence today: many of us on this call were not the target of these horrific slurs. Those of us who were and have been for most of our lives: we live in this violence. We generally don’t share it because it’s targeted and often we might feel non-professional in letting you know what’s going on and how it affects us. I myself personally hope that the eventual outcome of this event is an increase in empathy in now knowing what many of our community deal with more regularly. This was an outside attack, and it horrified us because it is the opposite of what we believe and how we act. We saw violence today, and it was a violence against our core values. We will not stand for it, and we will eventually be stronger for fighting it. Because we are a community, we will insist in making our space safe. We did not deserve this. What we do deserve is help and comfort and healing. I once again want to urge every one of you to take advantage of the resources we have at hand. Respectfully and lovingly, Heather -- *Heather Kirksey* VP, Ecosystem and Community LF Networking Mobile: +1.512.917.7938 Email/Google Talk: [email protected] IRC: HKirksey -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- Links: You receive all messages sent to this group. View/Reply Online (#7142): https://lists.onap.org/g/onap-tsc/message/7142 Mute This Topic: https://lists.onap.org/mt/77250649/21656 Group Owner: [email protected] Unsubscribe: https://lists.onap.org/g/onap-tsc/leave/2743226/1412191262/xyzzy [[email protected]] -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
