ACM CCS is committed to taking steps to enhance the
diversity and inclusion of our community. We value your
feedback and input. While not everyone may have the same
idea on how to make our community healthier and more
welcoming to everyone, we are eager to hear your diverse
ideas, and we hope that our efforts will lead to more open
conversations regarding this goal. If you have any
comments, questions, suggestions, or complaints, please
email the Conference Co-Chairs Giovanni Vigna
(vigna@ucsb.edu) or
Elaine Shi
(runting@cs.cmu.edu).
Inclusion and Diversity in Writing
As a large scientific and technical community that has a direct impact
on many people from different backgrounds around the world, Diversity
and Inclusion are crucial for the security community. ACM explains
these goals as follows. Diversity is achieved when the individuals
around the table are drawn from a variety of backgrounds and
experience, leading to a breadth of viewpoints, reasoning, and
approaches (also referred to as "the who"). Inclusion is achieved when
the environment is characterized by behaviors that welcome and embrace
diversity ("the how"). Both are important in our writing and other
forms of communication such as posters and talks.
Inclusion
Be mindful of not using language or examples that further the
marginalization, stereotyping, or erasure of any group of people,
especially historically marginalized and/or under-represented groups
(URGs) in computing. Of course, exclusionary treatment can arise
unintentionally. Be vigilant and actively guard against such issues in
your writing. Reviewers will also be empowered to monitor and demand
changes if such issues arise in your submissions. Here are some
examples of such issues for your benefit:
Examples of exclusionary and other non-inclusive writing to
consider avoiding:
- Implicit assumption: An example of data integrity constraints:
"Every person has a mother and a father." This example is exclusionary
and potentially hurtful to people from single-parent households and
people with same-sex parents.
- Oppressive terminology: Using the term "Master-Slave"
to describe a distributed data system architecture. This
can be hurtful to people whose families have suffered
the inhumanity of enslavement. A good source of
alternative terms to oppressive language often used in
computer science can be found
in this
article.
- Marginalization of URGs: An example of attribute domains: "The
Gender attribute is either Male or Female." This example is
exclusionary and potentially hurtful to people who are intersex,
transgender, third gender, two-spirit, agender, or have other
non-binary gender identities.
- Lack of accessibility: Using color alone to convey information
in a plot when good alternative data visualization schemes exist. This
can be exclusionary to people who are color-blind. Please consider
using patterns, symbols and textures to emphasize and contrast visual
elements in graphs and figures, rather than using colors alone. Use a
color-blind friendly palette that is designed with accessibility for
visually impaired people. Avoid bad color combinations such as
green/red or blue/purple.
- Stereotyping: Reinforcing gender stereotypes in names or
examples of roles, e.g., using only feminine names or presentations
for personal secretary or assistant roles.
Diversity
Going further, please also consider actively raising the
representation of URGs in your writing. Diversity of representation
helps create an environment and community culture that could
ultimately make our field more welcoming and attractive to people from
URGs. This is a small but crucial step you can take towards
celebrating and improving our community’s diversity. Examples of
infusing diversity into writing to consider adopting:
- Embracing different cultures: Names of people are a
visible way to enhance diversity of representation in
writing. Instead of reusing overused names in computing
such as Alice and Bob, consider using names from a
variety of languages, cultures, and nationalities, e.g.,
Alvarez and Bano. Avail of the many online resources on
this front for ideas,
e.g., this
article on names across different cultures.
- Embracing differences in figures: Depictions of people or
people-like icons in illustrations are also a good avenue to enhance
diversity of representation. Consider depicting people of different
gender presentations, skin colors, ability status, and other visible
attributes of people.
- Embracing gender diversity in pronouns: Consider using a variety
of gender pronouns across your named examples consciously, including
"he/him/his," "she/her/hers," and "they/them/theirs". Likewise,
consider using gender-neutral nouns when referring to generic roles,
e.g., "chairperson" or just "chair" instead of "chairman," and
gender-neutral pronouns for such roles.
Responsibility
Finally, if your work involves data-driven techniques
that make decisions about people, please consider
explicitly discussing whether it may lead to disparate
impact on different groups, especially URGs. Consider
discussing the ethical and societal implications. For
example, see
this article
discussing the potential for
disparate impact of facial recognition in healthcare and
strategies to avoid or reduce
harm. This SIGMOD
Blog article also gives a comprehensive overview of
various dimensions and approaches for responsible
application of data management ideas. We hope our
community can help permeate this culture of responsibility
and awareness about potentially harmful unintended
negative consequences of our work within the larger
computing landscape.
Acknowledgments and Further Reading
