Code of Conduct

The required standards of conduct for the Hack Club community & events.

The Whole Point

Most online spaces are somewhere between a gas station and a nuclear waste dump. At best, people come, take what they need, and leave. At worst, people poison each other, themselves, and everything around them.

It doesn’t have to be like this. An online community can be a place where people respect you, and care what happens to you. It can be the best community of your life. That is what we are doing at Hack Club. When you join us, you are committing to help us make that kind of community. This is hard, but worth it. Your job is to follow these principles:

  1. Treat everyone with respect and kindness
  2. Don’t degrade our shared spaces
  3. Make conflict productive
  4. Be Good, not just Not Bad

These principles are always good, but not always clear, so read on to see how we apply them in practice. No set of rules can perfectly capture the right thing to do in every situation. We will always hold you, and ourselves, to these values. If you do not follow these values, we will try and get you to change. If you do not change, we will remove you from Hack Club.

Where the Code of Conduct Applies

  • Our Slack
  • Clubs
  • Events (in-person or online) and affiliated programs
  • Our GitHub organization and repositories
  • Student-run organizations on HCB

The code of conduct applies to everyone who participates in these spaces, including Hack Clubbers, volunteers, staff, and alumni.

We may still take action when Hack Clubbers break the code of conduct while interacting with each other in non-Hack Club spaces.

Treat everyone with respect and kindness

  1. Be friendly and welcoming
  2. Do not say anything insulting, demeaning, hateful, or threatening
  3. Do not discriminate against people in your words or actions
  4. Do not harass or bully people
  • If someone asks you to leave them alone, you must leave them alone, even if you have friendly intentions
  1. Do not make unwelcome romantic or sexual advances
  • If you don't know whether advances will be welcome, don't make them

Don’t degrade our shared spaces

  1. Hack club spaces should be wholesome and high-quality. Don’t post:
  • Sexual content
  • Spam
  • Almost anything becomes spam if you do it too much
  • Ads without HQ permission
  1. Keep it appropriate for the context. Things might be acceptable in one context, but break the Code of Conduct in a different context. For example:
  • Jokes or memes that derail a serious discussion
  • Sharing or asking for personal information with people who don’t want to hear or give you personal information
  • Discussing sensitive and potentially uncomfortable topics around people who don’t want to talk about them, or are too young to talk about them
  1. Do not attempt to defraud Hack Club. We run on donations. Fraud doesn’t take money from a giant, faceless corporation; it takes it from another teenager.

Make conflict productive

  1. When someone disagrees with you, first try to understand what they think and why
  2. Do not escalate, even when provoked
  3. Do not rally sentiment against others
  4. Assume good faith.
  5. Be patient
  6. Think about how your words will be interpreted. Productive communication requires effort
  7. Take a moment to think before you speak in heated or fast-moving conversations Sometimes, it’s better to simply refrain from saying anything at all
  8. If you need help, reach out to the moderation team

Be Good, not just Not Bad

The wrong way to do Hack Club is to ask “what is the minimum needed to stay within the rules?”.

The right way to do Hack Club is to ask “what would a good person do in this situation?” and then do that, even if you don’t want to, and even if you think the rules don’t require it.

We all fall short sometimes. When it happens to you, don’t try to excuse it to yourself or others by saying “it’s not against the rules”.

Reporting Violations

You can contact us by:

  1. Emailing conduct@hackclub.com.
  2. Filing an anonymous or non-anonymous report on Slack via Shroud.
  3. Directly contacting the HQ staffer who oversees the place the incident happened

Reports are confidential. Reporters’ identifying information is not shared outside the Working group without direct consent.

This Code of Conduct is not generic legalese. This is our serious answer to the question "How do we make Hack Club an amazing, life-changing community?" We care about the Code of Conduct because we care about all of you.