The Libertarian Socialist Caucus is an organization of members of the Democratic Socialists of America who believe that libertarian socialist values are the fullest embodiment of this democratic socialist vision. We cherish the DSA’s status as a multi-tendency mass socialist organization and wish to create a space within the DSA to discuss and organize for the development of socialism beyond the state.

Values of Participation

• Meet your commitments. We value all forms of participation, but the most important way to participate is via following through on actions.  Show up at a meeting, make a conference call, make sure something in the ever growing list of tasks gets done.  Participation produces power.
• Expect best intentions. Aspire to act in comradery—make LSC comfortable, welcoming, supportive, respectful, sincere, and open.
• When giving feedback, keep it constructive. We value honesty, but only for the purpose of improvement, not for the sake of cruelty. On the opposite side of the spectrum, sugar-coating feedback in order to spare someone’s feelings is not necessarily constructive either. The goal is to be supportive, honest, and thoughtful.
• Relevance. Our Discord, Listserv, and Loomio are workspaces and we hope to keep them unobtrusive and accessible. Work to stay on-topic and take digressing conversations into other spaces—new channels, private groups, other platforms, etc.

Harassment and Abuse

We believe disagreement and differences of opinion are a natural part of community and are important to work through when building community, strategizing, and learning from one another, but we do not tolerate harassment in any form. Participants who engage in harassment or abuse may be removed from the group at the discretion of the organizers.

Harassment includes, but is not limited to

• Unwelcome comments regarding a person’s lifestyle choices and practices
• Deliberate intimidation or antagonism
• Exclusionary jokes or comments
• Unwelcome sexual attention or physical contact
• Sustained disruption of meetings, events, or online discussion
• Continued one-on-one communication after requests to cease
• Comments that reinforce social structures of domination (related to gender, gender identity and expression, sexual orientation, disability, physical appearance, body size, race, age, religion)
• Threats of violence

Abuse includes, but is not limited to

• Trolling, misdirection, and disrespectful use of resources and access

If you have been harassed or have witnessed abuse, please bring this to the attention of the group organizers (in meetings) or to members of the harassment grievance officers.

While in practice most actions from coordinators will be friendly reminders, they should act on complaints/reports quickly and involve other team members if necessary. They should take appropriate, usually private, action if they see any abuse or harassment. They must be sensitive to cultural differences, time zones, etc., but take prompt action when necessary.

Be Mindful of What You Say and Write

LSC members should be mindful of what they write and say in public LSC meetings and our communications channels.  Be aware that Discord and the listserv maintains records of our conversations indefinitely beyond our control. Do not say anything in a non-private channel that you do not want becoming public.

Working Groups

We organize much of our efforts and organization in working groups. WGs are organized by one or two individuals who are responsible for facilitating work and being a point of contact to the broader LSC, and reporting back to the larger group during our organizational meetings.

Working groups are a touchstone for new members who want to participate, and we encourage groups to reach out to new members.

Mailing List

The listserv should be used primarily for “official” communications - stuff that we want to make sure every member sees, such as votes and discussion about major issues.  Everything else should go on the Discord, but we also understand that comrades may have accessibility issues with Discord, so if you feel best using the listserv for communications, you always have that option.

Etiquette

• Manage your email delivery options. Sometimes contentious decisions can cause a lot of emails.  The mailing list allows a digest option to condense all discussion to a single email per day, but requires more work if you want to participate.  Consider using this if you think the amount of email is too much for you!
• Reply off-list. If you and another person seem to be the only ones really discussing on a thread, consider going to a private email or on discord to avoid including 1000 people in your discussion.

Discord

Etiquette

• Manage your notifications. LSC Discord can become quickly overwhelming without proper notification management. We recommend turning off notifications for all but your own name and any specific words or terms of interest to you. Have no shame in muting channels that you don’t have the desire or time to participate in.
• Use direct messages. Members of LSC range in expertise, talent, and experience. Feel free to reach out to folks with specific questions or needs. This is also a good space to take tangential conversations—no need to do everything in public.

Expropriated from the Tech Workers Coalition Community Guide.