I apologize for the yellow title, but in this case it really reflects the essence of the matter. A year ago, a blatant incident occurred in the Drupal developer community, which on Habr and even on the Russian Internet passed somewhat unnoticed. In the context of the recent turmoil around Linus and Linux, it makes sense to recall those events.

The cover of the 23rd book is “Renegades of Gor” in the saga of The Chronicles of Mountain.

One day at the end of February, Dries Buytaert, founder of CMS Drupal, asked Larry Garfield , one of the most active developers, to leave the project. There is every reason to believe that the decision was caused by the value differences of the generous project dictator with Larry. What is the essence of this discrepancy and where is Gore?

Dries Buytaert vs. Larry garfield

Horus - the anti-worlds of Earth from the John Nerman's The Chronicles of Horus series of books written in the 1960/1970s. A generation of role-playing and BDSM subculture has grown up around a series of science fiction novels. I can not judge the artistic merit of books, because I have not read it. It is known, however, that the author was criticized for apologetics of the rough style of male domination over the opposite sex.

As it turned out, Garfield was accused of being a member of BDSM and, to a much greater extent, of Gore communities, which he did not hide, but did not advertise either. He practices personal relations based on domination and submission in his personal life.

In the end, I fundamentally believe that all people are created equally. This is a belief that the Drupal project has been held since it's early days. I cant help you. It is a concept that women will be dominated by the law .

In a brief translation, this means that Dries Buytaert is convinced that people are created equal while Larry thinks otherwise. This project leader’s faith reflects the core values ​​around which the Drupal community is formed. Such as Larry, with his gore-philosophy, has no place in it.

Why do we know so much about Larry, because he, like any other person, has the right to privacy? After the trouble started, he posted on his page a post entitled TMI about me .

Judging by the developer’s story, he lived quietly by his own rules, did not impose them on anyone, and then someone noticed his profile on a large, closed, thematic forum with 5 million participants. After learning about some juicy details of Larry Garfield's personal life, they decided to take part in his fate.

Having collected screenshots of a seven-year-old prescription, they tried to bring it to light by putting this to the notice of other project participants. Around the information arose a stir, some activists began to conduct educational talks with him on the sidelines of Drupal conferences. It came to the project's Working Group , the Community Working Group , but there it was reasonable to decide that there was no cause for concern.

Nevertheless, activists got their way, and on February 24, 2017, Dries Buytaert called Larry Garfield to suggest the latter to completely withdraw from the Drupal project, including the cancellation of participation in conferences and even the project popularizer function in the PHP community.

Have been working personally, professionally, work, teach, educate, and build bridges. I have been treated for peers and equals. But I’m being actively undermined. I have already caused me direct, material, professional harm.

The following is a free translation.

For ten years of participation in Drupal, I taught others professional skills and the ability to build bridges. To all, without exception, I treated with respect, as an equal. However, now because some people have to do with my intimate life and what I write in private forums, I’m pursued, expelled from the project and my career is threatened. These actions have already caused me direct material and moral damage.

Some intrigue in this story was due to the fact that Dries Buytaert mentioned some shocking confidential information that he could not share with the rest. What does it contain? Does this have a direct bearing on the life of the Drupal community, or again some aspects of the developer’s private life? The project leader could not give a clear answer to these questions.

Unpleasant questions

Actually these questions suggest themselves.

1. Is BDSM and other unorthodox forms of the personal life of adults, built on mutual consent, a reason for ostracism and expulsion from the community of one of the participants?
2. Is it generally normal to persecute an open source project participant only on the basis that someone has dug a strawberry about his fantasies and hobbies?
3. What do Drupal developers actually think about this? Have there been cases of harassment, or Larry-style hits in Gore-style?
4. Has Larry Garfield violated the community rule, aka Code of Conduct, and if not, what do they need it for?
5. How about a set of conflict resolution rules, aka Conflict Resolution Policy, was it involved?

It is quite obvious that the answer to all these questions is negative. It seems that there was arbitrariness and this caused a backlash in the circles of open source supporters.

Happy end

A few days later, the hyper-active project leader retreated, updates in the post indicate how gradually it began to reach him, something that was obvious to many from the very beginning.

In confusing phrases, he is trying to prove that Larry’s fault is not at all in his way of thinking, but he cannot come up with a reasoned alternative explanation.

It’s clear that it’s clear that it’s not a problem.

In the latest updates, he already writes that they say all this is wrong, the one-person does not work and you need a collective leadership.

Today, Larry Garfield has been and remains one of the key developers of Drupal.

• The last commit of Larry is listed on 12/22/2017
• The last post on the Drupal blog was made 14 hours ago and currently has 129 comments.