Code of Conduct for Cycling Ireland Members!

C3PO

We recently received this communication onto our Club website!

At a Cycling Ireland Board Meeting on 2/Jul/2012 a Code of Conduct for Cycling Ireland members was approved, this Code sets out the standards of behaviour expected of Cycling Ireland members.
This CoC includes a clause for communications on the various public media *(point 4.7)
“Disparaging or inflammatory remarks are not to be made on websites, social media outlets etc. under the control
of Cycling Ireland or its constituent Provincial Executives, Commissions or Clubs.”

The complete text is here:
http://www.cyclingireland.ie/Home/News/CI-POLICY-015_Code_of_Conduct_for_Cycling_Ireland_.aspx

I'm wondering what people think of this new regulation? It seems to me to be an incredibly "wide-ranging" rule! Depending on your viewpoint much of the stuff on this and other forums could be regarded as disparaging and inflammatory! When does fair comment become disparaging or inflammatory? Who will be the judge of this? Could for example, recent posts about CIs Olympic selection policy fall foul of the new regulation?
If I say that I think that this is an extremely badly thought out and lazy "catch all" regulation could CI consider my comments to be disparaging or inflammatory?

Lumen

C3PO wrote: »

Disparaging or inflammatory remarks are not to be made on websites, social media outlets etc. under the control
of Cycling Ireland or its constituent Provincial Executives, Commissions or Clubs.”

My emphasis.

Boards.ie is not under the control of Cycling Ireland or its constituent Provincial Executives, Commissions or Clubs.

Neither is Twitter, Facebook etc.

C3PO

Lumen wrote: »

My emphasis.

Boards.ie is not under the control of Cycling Ireland or its constituent Provincial Executives, Commissions or Clubs.

Neither is Twitter, Facebook etc.

Yes, you're right of course Lumen (my bad) but it would apply to all the Club forums, some of which are very active!

Lumen

C3PO wrote: »

Yes, you're right of course Lumen (my bad) but it would apply to all the Club forums, some of which are very active!

Just register on your club forum as Anthony Moran, then flame away!

ednwireland

i'm so ignoring that

Beasty

I personally think it's perfectly reasonable to expect members and clubs to respect the organisation they are a member of on the sites they and their member clubs have control of. Other sports and organisations often apply much more stringent restrictions on what can or cannot be said in public

As Lumen points out it does not extend to other sites and so far as Boards is concerned most posters are pretty anonymous anyway (and I would not expect posters here to deliberately go out and make remarks that could be considered disparaging or inflammatory without something to back up their statements)

buffalo

So I can't give out about UCD sandbaggers on the Usher site? There's my planned Friday fun gone then.

C3PO

Beasty wrote: »

I personally think it's perfectly reasonable to expect members and clubs to respect the organisation they are a member of on the sites they and their member clubs have control of. Other sports and organisations often apply much more stringent restrictions on what can or cannot be said in public

As Lumen points out it does not extend to other sites and so far as Boards is concerned most posters are pretty anonymous anyway (and I would not expect posters here to deliberately go out and make remarks that could be considered disparaging or inflammatory without something to back up their statements)

I would agree Beasty, respect for the organisation should be expected from members but surely people have the right to express opinions and to disagree with an organisations policy? Depending on your viewpoint such disagreement could easily be seen as inflammatory or disparaging!
If for example I go on to my Club site and say that the CI offices are in a terrible state and this reflects the state of the organisation could this not be seen as both inflammatory and disparaging (even if it is true!) and this would then entitle CI to discipline my club?
The reason I am getting exercised about this is not simply theoretical but because of recent ongoing experiences we are having as a Club!

Jawgap

Obviously they don't get the concept of a loyal opposition

Beasty

There are plenty of ways to disagree without being disparaging or inflammatory though. If there is disagreement with CI policies/procedures, why not just have a discussion with them about it - I can't see any need for the debate to be in the public domain (although it could be appropriate to pubish any conclusions or agreements reached with supporting explanations).

CI seems to have appropriate appeals procedures to deal with disputes, and ultimately are responsible to their members and member clubs. If anyone has a fundamental grievance they could always be brought up at the AGM (or possibly at an EGM) and the members have the right to appoint the Board if they believe others can run CI in a more appropriate manner.

Chips Lovell

It's worded sufficiently vaguely for it to be impossible to pass judgement on the policy until we see it in operation. One man's inflammatory is another man's robust criticism.

Having said that, I've found Cycling Ireland to be very reasonable in all my dealings with them, so I'm not overly concerned.

dave_o_brien

Vladimir Kurtains wrote: »

It's worded sufficiently vaguely for it to be impossible to pass judgement on the policy until we see it in operation. One man's inflammatory is another man's robust criticism.

Having said that, I've found Cycling Ireland to be very reasonable in all my dealings with them, so I'm not overly concerned.

Well played, sir...

morana

C3PO wrote: »

We recently received this communication onto our Club website!

At a Cycling Ireland Board Meeting on 2/Jul/2012 a Code of Conduct for Cycling Ireland members was approved, this Code sets out the standards of behaviour expected of Cycling Ireland members.
This CoC includes a clause for communications on the various public media *(point 4.7)
“Disparaging or inflammatory remarks are not to be made on websites, social media outlets etc. under the control
of Cycling Ireland or its constituent Provincial Executives, Commissions or Clubs.”

The complete text is here:
http://www.cyclingireland.ie/Home/News/CI-POLICY-015_Code_of_Conduct_for_Cycling_Ireland_.aspx

I'm wondering what people think of this new regulation? It seems to me to be an incredibly "wide-ranging" rule! Depending on your viewpoint much of the stuff on this and other forums could be regarded as disparaging and inflammatory! When does fair comment become disparaging or inflammatory? Who will be the judge of this? Could for example, recent posts about CIs Olympic selection policy fall foul of the new regulation?
If I say that I think that this is an extremely badly thought out and lazy "catch all" regulation could CI consider my comments to be disparaging or inflammatory?

Sorry I am extremely busy elsewhere so I am not getting to boards much. We had a gap regarding the discrimination etc on social media and this is meant to plug it.

You can still have a go at me and the others on your club forum etc. but its just common sense like referring to peoples colour, sexual orientation etc.

If you are not happy please feel free to suggest alternative wording and we will consider. You can pm me.