Interesting to contrast this with, say, the SQLite developers, who also have very strong beliefs that are openly stated, but, are tolerant of others who don't share those beliefs and are happy for anyone to use their software regardless of whether they share the same views or not.
This is going crazy on the twitter feed, they are blocking everyone that even dares to express an opinion, or reposts the matter, including sponsors, that have removed their sponsorship as reponse to being blocked.
I guess it will take some time for the dust to settle and assess the damage and full course of events.
Regardless, from the looks of it so far, this Community Manager should probably be placed on forced leave and be stripped of all privileges, pending a thorough investigation. A psychiatric evaluation might also be warranted. Not because of any political ideology, but simply to assess if this person could and should be held accountable, legally and maybe even financially, for the inflicted damage to Godot as a project/product.
So far, it doesn't look good. Many years of hard work (maybe not so much code development but pretty much everything else) may have been irreparably damaged if not evaporated in mere days. Personally, I've been several times in a position where I considered Godot as the basis for application development. In hindsight I am now relieved I did not, for this drama would have turned that into a serious business liability. I can only imagine the (financial) implications for other companies who did pick Godot as a tech to build part of their business upon. While that may be considered collateral and "just the price of doing business", I'd would certainly hold this individual personally responsible for that damage. While a fork may mitigate some of the damage already done, it is not going to fix what went sideways here.
Based on just a cursory observation from what happened here, there is no doubt in my mind that (regardless of motivation or justification) this individual should never wield this much power, ever again. If Godot leadership does not take these actions back (into their own hands), it may find itself held accountable for the results of this situation. They may want to go find an experienced law firm too. I doubt this will be the end of this drama for them. While Open Source licenses may divert/absolve legal liability for technical/functionality/code-quality aspects, the same might not be true for liability as the result of harm-inducing behavior of individual people (like the kind that appears to have happened here).
If nothing else, let this episode be a lesson for doing proper vetting of people in a position of (potential) power. As most serious businesses know all too well, having anyone with opinions on the extremities of any ideological/political spectrum in a position of power, is typically not a bright idea. Though in this case I’d personally argue it’s a lot worse and appears to involve a mentally unhinged individual. Any reasonable person would have considered and reconsidered the implications of the actions so far taken .. and even then still waited for a considerable body of group consensus would have approved these actions before pressing the red button.
Seems like good way to destroy any good will anyone has for your engine... So now that both Godot and Unity are dead, what is next?
What a shitshow.
This type of radical ideology has infested so many companies and open source projects. NixOS, GNOME, Asahi Linux, Elementary OS, Red Hat, IBM...
What is the end goal of these political purges? How is hate speech and discrimination against people who disagree with your political views conducive to an open and inclusive environment? This is the same type of behavior they're criticizing the other side of doing. Not only that, but they're vilifying and excluding people who simply object to this behavior. It's hypocrisy and absolute insanity.
The only purge that needs to happen is of these SJWs from software projects and companies. The only thing they've achieved in the past decade is to stir some shit where there was none, to divide and exclude rather than diversify and include, and to annoy a whole bunch of people in the process. *Stop making everything political.*
I define myself politically as a Classical Liberal and therefore I strongly oppose pseudoscientific positions like those defended by the Critical Theory folks (aka "woke").
I wholeheartedly support the Godot team.
We can't tolerate each other. We can't be friends.
I know some people will tell that people like me are wrong, people like them are wrong, that we are both wrong, but you just need to educate yourself politically.
[flagged]
Based on the two main profiles shown... They are both deep into political discussions on Twitter and "anti-woke" rhetoric. Their "commentary" is inflammatory and toxic, so probably go banned for generally being tools.
IMO banning them is silly, but maintaining OSS is not fun and dealing with people who've made politics their whole shtick is even less fun.
Godot just posted their damage control response on X:
https://x.com/godotfoundation/status/1840721449364988300/pho...
https://x.com/godotfoundation/status/1840721449364988300/pho...
1) On Friday, we made a tweet that unexpectedly led to a wave of harassment directed at our staff and community. We unequivocally condemn this abuse.
The volume of negative engagement overwhelmed our moderation efforts. While attempting to protect the Godot community we mistakenly blocked individuals who were not participating in the harassment. The Godot Foundation Board takes full responsibility for these moderation actions.
If you believe you were blocked in error and have not violated our Code of Conduct, please contact us with the form linked below. We are committed to swiftly rectifying any mistakes.
We firmly stand by our mission to keep our community spaces free from hate, discrimination, and other toxic behaviors.
– The Godot Foundation Board
2) On community moderator Xananax
We strongly condemn the harmful language used by Xananax, moderator of an unofficial Godot-related Discord server.
We want to clarify that Xananax is not hired by nor a spokesperson for the Godot Foundation.
As an organization, we have our own official Discord server, moderated together with new volunteers vetted by our team.
– The Godot Foundation
I found their responses to be... insufficient and potentially blind to the amount the debacle affected public perception?