Re: Amendment to GR on GFDL, and the changes to the Social Contract

[Thomas Bushnell BSG <tb@becket.net>]

Stephen Gran <sgran@debian.org> writes:

> This one time, at band camp, Thomas Bushnell BSG said:
>> Christopher Martin <chrsmrtn@debian.org> writes:
>> > Yes. Because I would trust the developers to see the amendment as the silly 
>> > fraud that it would be, and vote it down. We don't need the Secretary's 
>> > protection, believe it or not.
>> 
>> Really?  Even if a majority of the developers liked the idea?
>> Remember, the 3:1 requirement is there to protect the remaining 25%
>> against majorities as high as 74%.
>
> If 51% of developers vote for something that silly, there is not much we
> can do to save the project, frankly.  Your attitude that we need hand
> holding and protection from ourselves is rather insulting.

This is not *my* attitude; it is the attitude of those who wanted a
3:1 supermajority for changes to the Foundation Documents.  What did
they mean by this, if not that a mere majority could not be trusted
with such things?

I was, in fact, *against* that change, though I didn't feel strongly
about it, and did not vote.  It is now the rule.  I assume that those
who put it forward thought a mere majority could not be trusted with
such things.  For the record, the proposer and seconders of that GR
(2003-03):

Manoj Srivastava [srivasta@debian.org]
Andrew Suffield [asuffield@debian.org]
Neil Roeth [neil@debian.org]
Steve Langasek [vorlon@debian.org]
Matthias Urlichs [smurf@debian.org]
Joe Nahmias [jello@debian.org]
Simon Law [sfllaw@debian.org]

Thomas