2021/Safe Space Policy

The organizers of WikiConference North America are dedicated to providing a harassment-free event experience for everyone, regardless of race, gender, gender identity and expression, sexual orientation, disability, physical appearance, body size, age, religion, marital status, or veteran status. We will encourage participants to conform to this Safe Space Policy, also called a Friendly Space Policy, and enforce it if necessary.

Harassment includes offensive comments related to any protected personal characteristic, sexual images in public spaces, deliberate intimidation, stalking, following, harassing photography or recording, sustained disruption of talks or other events, inappropriate physical contact, and unwelcome sexual attention. Participants asked to stop any harassing behavior are expected to comply immediately. This applies to everyone, including event staff and sponsors.

If a participant engages in harassing behavior, the event organizers may take any action they deem appropriate, including warning the offender or expulsion from the event.

If you are being harassed, notice that someone else is being harassed, or have any other concerns, please contact a member of event staff immediately. Event staff will be happy to help participants contact venue security or local law enforcement, provide escorts, or otherwise assist those experiencing harassment to feel safe for the duration of the event. We value your attendance.

Our conference is online, and it will include group video meetings, some of which are recorded or shown live. Please do not take photos of presenters of sessions that are not broadcast. This is a dynamic document.

Specifics (based on Wikimania 2021 policy)

 * Behavior that will not be tolerated
 * Our conference is international. Cultures differ. The point of view of the recipient of a message is important. Our safe space policy covers (but is not limited to) these issues:
 * Harassment: This includes offensive statements about gender, sexual orientation, disability, physical appearance such as physique, ethnicity or belief, representations of a sexual nature, conscious intimidation, stalking, persecution, unwanted photography or recording, repeated disruption of lectures and other events, undesirable physical contact and unwanted sexual attention. People who are warned about such behavior must cease immediately. This also includes: asking the same question several times after other participants tried to answer, asking very general questions that are not directly related to projects people are working on, calling out people asking for their opinion about a specific topic. Do not pester other users with repeated messages.
 * Violence and threats: Violence and threats of violence are not acceptable. This includes incitement of violence, including encouraging a person to commit self-harm. This includes posting or threatening to post other people’s personally identifying information ("doxxing") online.
 * Personal attacks: Conflicts naturally arise, but avoid personal attacks. It is not okay to insult, demean or belittle others. Attacking someone for their opinions, beliefs and ideas is not acceptable. Avoid yelling, and please let others speak.
 * Unwelcome sexual attention: This includes comments, jokes, or imagery of a sexual nature in interactions, communications, or presentation materials, as well as sexual images or text. Images with sexual connotations (e.g. implied by certain emojis) are often inappropriate or unwelcome.
 * Unwanted content: Be aware when you are sharing video or audio which might be disconcerting to others. Avoid posting content, pictures, or links that are unrelated to the current topic, or repeated or overly frequent posts. Don't overly promote a specific opinion or topic.
 * Use the pronouns a person has indicated are appropriate.

Background

 * The Friendly space policies and Event Ban policy apply to this event.
 * Wikimania Friendly space policy, analogous to this one.
 * Our basic conduct policies can be found on Wikimedia DC's website
 * For matters not explicitly listed, the Wikimedia Universal Code of Conduct applies to this event and all Wikimedia events.