EuroPython 2024 Code of Conduct Transparency Report

Naomi Ceder -

The 2024 version of the EuroPython conference took place both online and in person in July 2024. This was the second conference under our new Code of Conduct (CoC), and we had Code of Conduct working group members continuously available both online and in person.

Reports

We had 4 Code of Conduct working group members continuously available both online and in person. Over the course of the conference the Code of Conduct team was made aware of the following issues:

  • A disabled person had requested reserved seating for talks, but when he arrived the first day, there was none. He reported this to a CoC member, who filed a report with Ops. It turned out that while the request had been gathered on the web form, there was no mechanism to get that information to the people involved. Once they were informed, the issue was quickly resolved, and the reporter expressed satisfaction with the way it was handled.
  • One person was uncomfortable with having their last name shown on Discord. They were informed that they could change that as soon as the registration bot ran, limiting the exposure to a minute or so, or that they could come to the registration desk for assistance. The report came via email and there was no response to the email suggesting those options.
  • An attendee reported that one talk's slides included a meme that seemed to reflect a racist trope. The CoC team reviewed that talk's slides, and agreed that the meme might be interpreted that way. A member of the CoC team contacted the presenter who immediately agreed to remove that meme before uploading the slides, and the video team was alerted to edit that meme out of the talk video before final publication.
  • There were multiple reports that the toilet signage was confusing and causing people to be uncomfortable with choosing a toilet. Once this was reported the signage was adjusted to make the gender designation visible and no further reports were received. It should be noted that none of the complaints objected to the text of the signs, just to the fact that covering of gender markers led to people entering a toilet they didn't want to.
  • The CoC team also were presented with a potential lightning talk topic that had caused complaints at another conference due to references to current wars that some viewers found disturbing. Since lightning talks are too short for content warnings to be effective, and since they are not reviewed in any detail by the programme committee, the CoC team counselled the prospective presenter against using the references that had been problematic at a prior conference. Given that advice, the presenter elected not to submit that topic.