Rules surrounding discord server language

[ManonLef]

Title	Author	Date
Add our server language to the rules	Manon	2024-07-12

Addition to the rules that our discord server is English

Summary

Add a rule that states we decided on English being the server language and we expect all conversation to happen in English. If needed we can also update the faq on why we made this decision.

Motivation

A moderator requested a user to speak English on our server and another earner pointed out it wasn't in the rules. I told them I'd bring it up to the team so here we are.

Suggested implementation

As described above

Drawbacks

Are there any drawbacks to this proposal? consider the following:

Not that I can think of since we already enforce this, but it will be nicer to have it in the rules as well so we can back this up where needed.

[ManonLef]

@TheOdinProject/moderators @TheOdinProject/maintainers I'd like your input.

[xandora]

Sounds reasonable, it's the de facto standard we expect anyway. If someone pushed back simply because it's not explicitly stated, then I guess they get a rule for it created.

[MaoShizhong]

Agreed. If it's something we enforce, it should be backed by a rule

[JustWaveThings]

Agreed. I thought at one point somewhere it is mentioned we communicate in English because all of our resources are in English. I'm not finding that mention now though.

[Mclilzee]

This is a good addition to our rules, we always enforced this rule, might as well make it official.

[rlmoser99]

I'm not a big fan of having this be a stand-alone rule, but I think we can tie it in with another rule.

Discuss topics that are safe and welcoming for everyone

✅ Discuss topics that are relevant to our curriculum or have an off-topic channel.

or

Ask questions in public channels for anyone to answer

✅ Ask questions in public channels because everyone in this community shares the responsibility to answer questions and others can learn from reading the conversation. It is unfair to expect specific people to answer your question.

Both of these are close to the "heart" of why we would want to saw that English as the server language.

[rlmoser99]

Actually, the more I think about it, I think it belongs in our welcome message and not part of a specific rule, because it ties into "providing a friendly, safe and welcoming environment for all"

My proposed paragraph is bolded below, so you can easily see the addition. I am open to any suggestions to this wording.

Welcome To The Odin Project!

Our Discord server is a very active community of people from all over the world and is moderated by a team of volunteers. Our moderation team has 3 different roles: Core, Maintainer, and Moderator.

Our moderation team is committed to providing a friendly, safe and welcoming environment for all, regardless of level of experience, gender identity and expression, sexual orientation, disability, neurodivergence, personal appearance, body, race, ethnicity, age, religion, nationality, or other similar characteristic.

Our curriculum and server's official language is English, so all communication in this server should also be in English. Use of this shared language allows everyone to participate in the conversation.

We expect everyone to handle themselves in a respectful manner and follow the spirit of our community rules.

When a rule has been broken, the moderators will assume everyone had positive intentions and will try to de-escalate the situation by having a conversation to clarify the expectations of our rules. If you are contacted by our moderation team, please do not take it personally or become argumentative. We realize that we have higher standards than the average Discord server to ensure the safety and wellbeing of our entire community.

[Eduardo06sp]

I'm in favor of rlmoser's suggestion if it is a mere suggestion/recommendation.

If we want to actually enforce it, we will definitely need to put it in the rules somewhere.

I saw someone typing in (mostly) Hindi the other day, so I just popped into Google Translate to understand it. Personally, I am in favor of taking rlmoser's approach without strictly enforcing unless it becomes an actual problem.

If I see someone speaking another language, I would rather tell them: "The majority of our users speak English. I highly recommend you communicate in English to increase the chances that you get help for your problem."
as opposed to:
you are not allowed to communicate in languages other than English.

If we want to be open and welcoming to everyone, I think this approach would be more in line with that.

[bycdiaz]

I also prefer the idea of this being a suggestion vs a rule.

As we draft that recommendation, I really want us to be explicit about our community being diverse and welcoming to everyone and share reasons why everyone benefits from communicating in a common language. I also ask that we stay away from the specific phrase "English Only" because of the connotations that this phrase can carry.