Re: How we are being silently manipulated - a fresh example - Was: Re: QT4CG meeting 120 draft minutes, 6 May 2025

Hi Bethan,
Thank you for replying in the current thread.

It seems to me that email is not the best form of discussing this issue - I
would be happy to discuss this in a more collaborative way - say via a
real-time conversation on Slack.

I have already provided the facts of what happened - how important
information was withheld from the participants in the meeting, and we have
the presenter's own response (himself) that he is not responsible for not
bringing out this important information and the participants must have read
in advance the PR and be informed about this particular issue.

Raising a PR just a few days before the meeting and requiring everyone to
have read all the text in detail.

Withholding information is not lying, it is what some call a "white lie".

And when such withholding of "inconvenient" information would help the
approval of your PR? What do you call this? Well, I call it "manipulation"
- and maybe I am wrong.

No matter what this is called, it is important that people have the full
information before making a decision. Now that we have the details,
everybody can judge for themselves.

More importantly, let us think about how to make sure that in our future
work we will be able to minimize the chances of such things happening again.

Thanks,
Dimitre


On Wed, May 7, 2025 at 7:51 AM Bethan Tovey-Walsh <accounts@linguacelta.com>
wrote:

> I don't pretend to understand the technical issues anywhere near as well
> as you do, Dimitre, nor as well as those who have already commented on your
> objections to the PR. However, I do want to address some other aspects of
> what you say.
>
> (I hope this isn't necessary, but I want to make clear that I'm writing
> purely from my own perspective. Nothing I say should be taken as a
> reflection of views or feelings other than my own.)
>
> > Just a fresh example... I wonder how many times similar concealments
> happened in the past, hence what bag of snakes our specifications might
> turn out to be.
>
> > As for the people that intentionally conceal from us crucial information
> when proposing their PRs - well, let everybody knows that this "works" in
> the QT4 group.
>
> You have been given ample space to express your concerns about this PR,
> both in writing and orally in the CG meetings. This is how a discussion
> should work: the proposer of a PR gives the information that s/he thinks is
> useful and relevant, and then other CG members add their own perspectives.
> Part of the community's role is to identify strengths and weaknesses, fill
> in gaps, and so on. In this case, you believe you have identified
> weaknesses, and you have been given plenty of space to explain your
> perspective. There has been no attempt to silence you, nor to block you
> from explaining your views in great detail.
>
> I cannot understand where you find the evidence to support your persistent
> claims of manipulation and intentional concealment of information. You feel
> strongly that there is a flaw in the PR; the author has listened to your
> concerns, and explained why he does not share them. That somebody disagrees
> with your interpretation may be frustrating, but it isn't evidence of
> manipulation, concealment, conspiracy, or any other Machiavellian behaviour.
>
> You have every right to raise concerns about the technical content of the
> PR. Personally, I am glad that you have done so: I find it interesting and
> rewarding to hear from someone with so much more knowledge and experience
> than myself. Making unfounded ad hominem attacks, however, undermines your
> technical arguments; you cannot introduce such an obvious logical fallacy
> into one part of your argument without undermining your entire discourse.
>
> Perhaps more importantly, your insinuations are insulting to the person
> you are attacking. They are also insulting to the group as a whole, whom
> you apparently see as a collection of mindless stooges who are incapable of
> making intelligent judgements about the merits of different technical
> proposals, and who are likely to have allowed countless deliberately flawed
> PRs to pass by them. I am, therefore, genuinely confused about your
> enthusiasm to contribute to a community which you apparently view as being
> made up of manipulators, on the one hand, and idiots, on the other.
>
> Very best,
>
> Bethan
>
>