Borrowed heavily from the News Product Alliance Code of Conduct — thank you, Feli ❤️

Splice is dedicated to providing a harassment-free experience for everyone. We do not tolerate harassment of anyone in this community in any form.

This code of conduct applies to all Splice spaces, including virtual and in-person events, mailing lists, and online forums, both online and off. Anyone who violates this code of conduct may be sanctioned and/or expelled from these spaces at the discretion of the Splice owners.

Some Splice spaces may have additional rules in place, which will be made clearly available to participants. Participants are responsible for knowing and abiding by these rules. By participating in a Splice event — in-person like Beta, or online like School of Splice — we expect you to share the same values described below regardless of your nationality, your culture, your gender, or your company.

Read our commitment to access, diversity, and inclusivity

Harassment includes

• Offensive comments related to gender, gender identity and expression, sexual orientation, disability, mental illness, neurotypicality or neuroatypicality, physical appearance, body size, age, race, or religion

• Unwelcome comments regarding a person’s lifestyle choices and practices, including those related to food, health, parenting, drugs, and employment

• Deliberate misgendering or use of ‘dead’ or rejected names

• Gratuitous or off-topic sexual images or behavior in spaces where they’re not appropriate

• Physical contact and simulated physical contact (eg, textual descriptions like “hug” or “backrub”) without consent or after a request to stop

• Threats of violence

• Incitement of violence towards any individual, including encouraging a person to commit suicide or to engage in self-harm

• Deliberate intimidation

• Stalking or following

• Harassing photography or recording, including logging online activity for harassment purposes

• Sustained disruption of discussion

• Unwelcome sexual attention

• Pattern of inappropriate social contact, such as requesting/assuming inappropriate levels of intimacy with others

• Continued one-on-one communication after requests to cease

• Deliberate “outing” of any aspect of a person’s identity without their consent except as necessary to protect vulnerable people from intentional abuse

  
  

Splice prioritises marginalised people’s safety over privileged people’s comfort. The Splice owners reserve the right not to act on complaints regarding

• ‘Reverse’ -isms, including ‘reverse racism,’ ‘reverse sexism,’ and ‘cisphobia’

• Reasonable communication of boundaries, such as “leave me alone,” “go away,” or “I’m not discussing this with you”

• Communicating in a ‘tone’ you don’t find congenial

• Criticising racist, sexist, cissexist, or otherwise oppressive behaviour or assumptions

  
  
  

We’re not kidding about any of this. We will take complaints seriously. So if you’re in violation of this Code, we will take action, which could include calling you out, asking you to stop immediately, warning you in private, deleting your posts in violation, expelling you from all our virtual and physical spaces, deleting your accounts, and if necessary, reporting you to the authorities and taking legal recourse. 

By participating in a Splice event, we expect you to share the same values described above. If you find this unacceptable, the Splice community is not for you.

Things you should do

Here’s what you can do if you see an uncomfortable situation unfolding as a bystander.

Be direct. The direct approach is to step in and tell the perpetrator that their behaviour is inappropriate and unacceptable, and that they should stop. This is the most obvious approach, but might not always be the best idea as it also tends to carry the most risk of inadvertently escalating the situation.

Delegate. Delegating refers to informing someone else about the situation so that they can intervene. For example, if you see someone harassing another person at a bar or club, you could tell the bartender or bouncer, who are (hopefully!) trained to deal with such situations. This could be a useful option if you see something happening but don’t feel like it would be safe for you to step in yourself.

Distract. One way to be an active bystander is to provide a distraction that interrupts the harassment and makes it difficult for the perpetrator to continue. For example, if you notice that someone is uncomfortable in an interaction, you could step in to ask them a question that changes the subject or interrupts whatever is going on at that point. It could be as simple as asking them if they know what the next session at the conference is, or if they could help you with something (and then you can use this as an excuse to extricate them from that conversation too).

Document. Documenting harassment, such as getting a video or audio recording, can be useful. This is especially if the victim of the harassment might want to report the incident later.

Delay (after the incident has occurred). After the harassment has occurred — whether you managed to become an active bystander or not — you could check in with the victim to see how they are doing. Focus on their feelings and give them space to say what they want to say.

Either way, let’s protect people who feel threatened or violated. Be an ally. We are all responsible for creating a safe environment for each other in this community.