AskToLeave

(This page intended as temporary notepad for resolving mostly minor day-to-day drama in the space without engaging the whole NB-Discuss mailing list ...)

Guidelines

(Also, here's some helfpful perspective excerpted from said mailing list ...)

https://www.noisebridge.net/pipermail/noisebridge-discuss/2013-March/034846.html

[...] one of the reasons why the Noisebridge tradition has emerged
over the last few years of asking people to leave and come back at
meeting is to defuse immediate situations. It doesn't mean anything more
than some matter has arisen that the people involved feel uncomfortable
handling on their own, and would rather discuss it with the wider
community.

It's not intended as a punishment. Indeed, if one feels outraged that
one will have to spend a maximum of seven days not at Noisebridge, I do
rather think one is probably making Noisebridge too much of your life,
and need a break anyway. 

I also strongly believe the following points represent a consensus
position at this point, although it isn't the sort of thing that we put
through official consensus, it's definitely something that fits with
what most of us do when we're doacratically handling these situations.

1. If you're in an argument with somebody that seems irresolvable and
looks like it's escalating, you or they should ask the other to leave
and come back to meeting. It's okay for both sides to do that, because
that gets the confrontation out of the space, and gives time for people
to calm down. 

2. It's considered excellent to leave and come to the meeting. It counts
in your favor.

3. Not leaving isn't excellent, because at that point at least one
person is stuck in an immediately intractable problem. 

4. Neither is it excellent to leave, and coming back before meeting. Nor
should thou take over an hour leaving and then hover around the gate,
very slowly picking up your laptop pieces, like with Junior that last
time.

5. It's almost certainly not excellent, incidentally, to try and game
this by just repeatedly asking people to leave and come back at the next
meeting, and then like two minutes after the meeting, ask them to leave
and come back to the next meeting, etc. There are many other exploits like
this that you can think of. Almost all of them fall under another
widely-held hackerspace axiom, "don't be a dick", and won't get you any
credit when you come to the meeting with a big grin on your face.
Indeed, you may find that the person who did the asking to leave will be
in far bigger disgrace than the person who left. This happens. A lot.

5. If you feel ABSOLUTELY outraged about being kicked out, come back at
meeting, and almost certainly other people will feel ABSOLUTELY OUTRAGED
on your behalf, or perhaps roll their eyes at what happened. It is a
good way to see how the rest of the community feels. It is very unlikely
that if you are asked to leave for a dumb reason that the rest of the
meeting will sympathise with the person telling you to leave. If they
do, perhaps your OUTRAGE was misplaced.

6. And yes you are part of a community, and your big "nobody tells *me*
what to do" isn't actually the anarchism we practice here. Otherwise you
could just turn the place into a satanic ice cream parlor and everyone
would be like woooo anarchy, which they would not. Well, maybe at first,
but then they would be like why are these arduinos vanilla flavored and
melting, and the crying would begin.

Ongoing

Friday May 17th 2013

I asked Scud and Chrissie to leave the space after they had occupied one of the bathrooms from 3:30 until 4 PM. They seemed to understand that they should not return until the Tuesday meeting. They initially left without drama ... a few hours later, they returned (first Chrissie, then Scud). Both were asked to leave again.

Saturday May 18th 2013

Paula(?) was asked to leave in the morning. After prolonged discussion, she did.

Scud and Chrissie came back around 9 PM - refused to leave after being asked by several people. (Some background info Meeting_Notes_2013_01_15#Heavy_users and Meeting_Notes_2013_01_29#Discussion_Notes). Around 10:15, a critical mass of sincere people successfully encouraged them to leave.