# Community Of Ideas

This statement of aspirations and principles of discussion is a work in
progress, as are all communities.  Expect text and perhaps URL to change.

A healthy, vibrant community depends on its members creating, importing, and
discussing new ideas openly, and welcoming constructive criticism.  To foster
this kind of community, we must not just tolerate honest differences of
opinion, but take them in the spirit of friendship and an assumption of good
faith.  While some ideas may be incompatible with a given community, even most
of those should be considered before dismissal.  Only when an idea is not new,
and its presentation offers no reason to revisit, or when the person conveying
the idea has ill intent or brings harm either negligently or intentionally,
should we react with intolerance for someone presenting an idea.

To do otherwise is to invite the development of ignorance in an echo chamber,
producing stagnation and a failure of positive ideals.

To foster healthy community, please:

* Accept that others are different, and allow them their right to be different,
  to think differently, and to value different things.

* Avoid blatant sophistry.  If you do not wish to discuss a topic honestly and
  in good faith, please refrain from discussing it at all.  You may express
  your desire to opt out of the discussion if necessary, and even state your
  objection, but using the rhetorical equivalent of asymmetric warfare tactics
  against a community of ideas is anathema.

* Encourage new ideas, but not uncritically.

* Forgive accidental offense, especially when acknowledged and retracted, or
  innocent acts producing harm, especially when repaired.

* Grant the benefit of the doubt.  Assume good faith on the part of others, and
  assume that, when another person speaks of that other's own state of mind and
  intent, the person is the foremost expert and authority on the subject of what
  is going on in the person's own head.

* Handle immediate differences by calmly and rationally discussing the matter,
  deferring resolution for later, or agreeing to disagree.

* Judge ideas and actions on their merits, not their broader cultural
  acceptability.

* Make an effort to address, or at least not sabotage, an ongoing topic of
  discussion that does not undermine the principles of a community of ideas.
  When discussion strays from such a topic, and others wish to return to the
  previous unfinished topic from a digression, make an effort to accommodate.

* Recognize a right to free speech, but also a right to free association; that
  someone has a right to say something does not imply a right to be heard by
  someone who does not wish to hear it, but neither does a right to ignore
  someone translate into a right to tell others to shut up.

* Refrain from using pejorative language or polarizing disparagements to
  dismiss others.

* Respect requests from community members to improve the signal:noise ratio by
  ending contentious, repetitive, or spammy messaging.

* Respect the ethos of the community, and refrain from arguing against it when
  others are not interested.

* Understand that disagreement does not alone imply bad behavior or bad
  intentions, even on subjects of an ethically significant nature, and behave
  accordingly when interacting with those who disagree with you.

* Value well-considered differences of opinion.

* Welcome even those who add little or nothing, so long as they do not, on
  balance, subtract value from the community.