Code of Conduct

The Texas Tribune, as a nonpartisan nonprofit newsroom, believes in the importance of communities coming together to have honest, robust and meaningful discussions about the issues and policies that directly impact them.

One of the key components of our ability to have such discussions is the respect that the members of our community show one another. We believe this is crucial to the success of our events and our organization as a whole. To ensure Festival attendees feel safe and welcome, we will not tolerate any harassment based on race, gender identity, sexual orientation, religion, disability, socioeconomic or immigration status, age, national origin or ethnicity.

Reporting a Problem

Our team is committed to working in partnership with our virtual community to ensure that everyone who attends this year’s Festival feels welcomed and included. Please alert Festival staff if you notice any examples of harassment, the spreading of misinformation or any other violations of this Code of Conduct. You can alert staff by emailing festival@texastribune.org.

We expect all participants — attendees, speakers and sponsors — to follow the Code of Conduct during the conference. This includes conference-related social events and related online communities and social media. Participants asked to stop any harassing behavior are expected to comply immediately. Conference participants violating this Code of Conduct may be expelled from the Festival without a refund, and/or banned from future Texas Tribune events, at the discretion of Tribune staff.

• Exercise consideration and respect in your speech and actions.
  
  
• Passionate conversations are part of solving problems. Disagreements happen all the time and are necessary to consider difficult questions. That said, we ask that you keep conversations professional, respectful and consider other parties’ points of view. In short, don’t make it personal.
  
  
• Remember that the boundaries of good taste, humor, personal space and physical interaction differ from person to person; if you sense someone feels uncomfortable — whether they explicitly state it or not — be respectful of those boundaries.
  
  
• Refrain from overt political endorsements or political fundraising while participating in our online social events related to online communities and social media pages. This includes, but is not limited to:
  • Fundraising on behalf of a political campaign or political action committees
  • Promoting or sharing promotional materials on behalf of a political campaign or political action committee
  • Sharing links, images, videos or other content owned by or created on behalf of a political campaign or political action committee
  
  
• Refrain from demeaning, discriminatory or harassing language and behavior. Harassment and inappropriate behavior may include, but are not limited to:
  
  • Sexist, racist, homophobic, transphobic or otherwise discriminatory jokes or language
  • Verbal intimidation or unwelcome, repeated direct communications online
  • Sustained disruption of talks or events
  • Posting or displaying sexually explicit or violent material
  • Unwelcome sexual attention. This includes sexualized comments/ jokes and unwelcome sexual advances
  • Advocating for, or encouraging, any of the above behavior

Above text is licensed CC BY-SA 4.0, adapted from ONA18 Code of Conduct (Adapted from the SRCCON Code of Conduct and the Citizen Code of Conduct; in consultation with the Geek Feminism community anti-harassment policy, O’Reilly Media’s conference Code of Conduct, the Coral Project’s Code of Conduct, and conversations with multiple community managers in journalism in developing our Code of Conduct.)