ROSE Blog: Rikki's Open Source Exchange

The Con Anti-Harassment Project is a grassroots effort to help prevent harassment – particularly sexual harassment – at events. The site says:

"The Con Anti-Harassment Project is a grass-roots campaign designed to help make conventions safer for everyone. Our aims are to encourage fandom, geek community and other non-business conventions to establish , articulate and act upon anti-harassment policies, especially sexual harassment policies, and to encourage mutual respect among con-goers, guests and staff."

The project wants events to adopt policies against verbal and physical harassment; articulate these policies to attendees, volunteers, and staff; and then act upon these policies in the case of harassment. The project site includes links to a letter-writing campaign, a "Con Database," and the Open Source Women Back Each Other Up Project and Gentlemen's Auxiliary.

I've been to a lot of events since my first LinuxWorld in 2000 and I've never felt harassed. In fact, I think the open source community as a whole has become friendlier and more inclusive over the years, and 2008 was a particularly good year to be a woman in open source. But there will always be exceptions, such as the Open Source Boob Project, which created quite an online stir a few months ago.

To find out more about the Con Anti-Harassment Project, read Karen Healey's announcement on the girl-wonder.org site.