I personally support sudo's policy on this, rather than a policy in which you cannot ban someone from a space for safety issues until mediation is handled. It is not possible to keep an area a safe space if people cannot be asked to leave until mediation (which should be conducted off property) has been facilitated. (Obviously sudo's policy in general is going to stick in a sudo room issue, but I thought I'd bring it up because I have a lot of ~feels about it.)

Someone temporarily losing access to the Omni is not nearly as concerning to me as facilitating a culture in which we keep people around who have repeatedly made people unsafe or participated in acts of violence.

I also feel like large public meetings on matters like these facilitate shaming the person of discussion more than they promote fairness. And if the person in question is there, people feel unsafe and honest discussion can't happen anyway.

I also agree that it's tough when it's someone known well to the community rather than an unestablished stranger. However, I think rather than looking at it as a ban, one could look at it as giving Elliot the space and resources to heal and strengthen, which is clearly not happening in this community, with the hopes of at some point welcoming Elliot back to sudo with open arms.

On Mon, Jan 12, 2015 at 4:11 PM, yar <yardenack@gmail.com> wrote:
On Mon, Jan 12, 2015 at 3:33 PM, Eske Silver <eske.silver@gmail.com> wrote:
> We do already (or damn oughta) have precident for these interactions...

Sudoroom has many long-standing policies for this. First, any Sudoroom
member is empowered to ask a non-member to leave at any time. Second,
when a person's presence makes someone else feel unsafe, we ask them
to leave and not return until the end of a conflict resolution process
(if they want one). The process involves a mediator and steward having
private meetings and then reporting back afterwards. Facts and
arguments are not hashed out at a public meeting unless the process
has failed spectacularly. We've never had to do that.

Sudoroom values fairness, but we have always prioritized safety over fairness.

WRT Elliot, I haven't been around enough lately to know, but it sounds
like we've kicked out many strangers for less and never thought twice.
It's so much easier to be lenient with a familiar face, but that's not
"fair"...