Our Commitment

The African Ruby Community is dedicated to providing a harassment-free and inclusive event experience for everyone regardless of gender identity and expression, sexual orientation, disabilities, neurodiversity, physical appearance, body size, ethnicity, nationality, race, age, religion, or other protected category.

Expected Behavior

Be Excellent to Each Other

We want the event to be an excellent experience for everyone regardless of gender identity and expression, sexual orientation, disabilities, neurodiversity, physical appearance, body size, ethnicity, nationality, race, age, religion, or other protected category. Treat everyone with respect. Participate while acknowledging that everyone deserves to be here and each of us has the right to enjoy our experience without fear of harassment, discrimination, or condescension, whether blatant or via micro-aggressions.

Speak Up If You See or Hear Something

Harassment is not tolerated, and you are empowered to politely engage when you or others are disrespected. The person making you feel uncomfortable may not be aware of what they are doing, and politely bringing their behavior to their attention is encouraged. If you are being harassed or feel uncomfortable, notice that someone else is being harassed, or have any other concerns, please contact a member of the event staff immediately.

Unacceptable Behavior

Harassment is not tolerated and includes but is not limited to:

Verbal language that reinforces social structures of domination
Sexual imagery in public spaces
Deliberate intimidation, stalking, or 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.

Scope

This policy extends to talks, forums, workshops, code labs, social media, parties, hallway conversations, all attendees, partners, sponsors, volunteers, event staff, etc.

The African Ruby Community reserves the right to refuse admittance to, or remove any person from, any African Ruby Community-hosted event (including future events) at any time in its sole discretion.

Our zero-tolerance policy means that we will look into and review every allegation of violation of our Event Community Guidelines and Anti-Harassment Policy and respond appropriately.

Exhibiting Partners and Sponsors

Exhibiting partners, sponsors or vendor booths, or similar activities are also subject to this policy. In particular, exhibitors should not use sexualized images, activities, or other material. Booth staff (including volunteers) should not use sexualized clothing/uniforms/costumes, or otherwise create a sexualized environment.

Why This Policy is Important

Harassment at events and in online communities is unfortunately common. Creating an official policy aims to improve this by making it clear that harassment of anyone for any reason is not acceptable within our events and communities. This policy may prevent harassment by clearly defining expectations for behavior, aims to provide reassurance, and encourages people who have had bad experiences at other events to participate in this one.

License and Attribution

This policy is licensed under the Creative Commons Zero license.

This policy is based on and influenced by several other community policies including the Ohio LinuxFest Anti-Harassment policy, Con Anti-Harassment Project, Geek Feminism Wiki (created by the Ada Initiative), ConfCodeofConduct.com, JSconf, Rust, Diversity in Python, and Write/Speak/Code.

Code de conduite