Re: [PATCH 1/1] MAINTAINERS: Remove myself

[Danilo Krummrich <dakr@kernel.org>]

On Sat, Feb 15, 2025 at 08:37:53AM +0100, Karol Herbst wrote:
> I was pondering with myself for a while if I should just make it official
> that I'm not really involved in the kernel community anymore, neither as a
> reviewer, nor as a maintainer.
> 
> Most of the time I simply excused myself with "if something urgent comes
> up, I can chime in and help out". Lyude and Danilo are doing a wonderful
> job and I've put all my trust into them.
> 
> However, there is one thing I can't stand and it's hurting me the most.
> I'm convinced, no, my core believe is, that inclusivity and respect,
> working with others as equals, no power plays involved, is how we should
> work together within the Free and Open Source community.
> 
> I can understand maintainers needing to learn, being concerned on
> technical points. Everybody deserves the time to understand and learn. It
> is my true belief that most people are capable of change eventually. I
> truly believe this community can change from within, however this doesn't
> mean it's going to be a smooth process.
> 
> The moment I made up my mind about this was reading the following words
> written by a maintainer within the kernel community:
> 
> 	"we are the thin blue line"
> 
> This isn't okay. This isn't creating an inclusive environment. This isn't
> okay with the current political situation especially in the US. A
> maintainer speaking those words can't be kept. No matter how important
> or critical or relevant they are. They need to be removed until they
> learn. Learn what those words mean for a lot of marginalized people. Learn
> about what horrors it evokes in their minds.
> 
> I can't in good faith remain to be part of a project and its community
> where those words are tolerated. Those words are not technical, they are
> a political statement. Even if unintentionally, such words carry power,
> they carry meanings one needs to be aware of. They do cause an immense
> amount of harm.
> 
> I wish the best of luck for everybody to continue to try to work from
> within. You got my full support and I won't hold it against anybody trying
> to improve the community, it's a thankless job, it's a lot of work. People
> will continue to burn out.
> 
> I got burned out enough by myself caring about the bits I maintained, but
> eventually I had to realize my limits. The obligation I felt was eating me
> from inside. It stopped being fun at some point and I reached a point
> where I simply couldn't continue the work I was so motivated doing as I've
> did in the early days.
> 
> Please respect my wishes and put this statement as is into the tree.
> Leaving anything out destroys its entire meaning.
> 
> Respectfully
> 
> Karol
> 
> Signed-off-by: Karol Herbst <kherbst@redhat.com>

@Steven, @Masami: Can I get an ACK for taking this through the drm-misc tree?

(Not cutting any context, since you have not been copied on this one.)

- Danilo

> ---
>  MAINTAINERS | 2 --
>  1 file changed, 2 deletions(-)
> 
> diff --git a/MAINTAINERS b/MAINTAINERS
> index 25c86f47353de..ca31e57fa203c 100644
> --- a/MAINTAINERS
> +++ b/MAINTAINERS
> @@ -7431,7 +7431,6 @@ F:	Documentation/devicetree/bindings/display/panel/novatek,nt36672a.yaml
>  F:	drivers/gpu/drm/panel/panel-novatek-nt36672a.c
>  
>  DRM DRIVER FOR NVIDIA GEFORCE/QUADRO GPUS
> -M:	Karol Herbst <kherbst@redhat.com>
>  M:	Lyude Paul <lyude@redhat.com>
>  M:	Danilo Krummrich <dakr@kernel.org>
>  L:	dri-devel@lists.freedesktop.org
> @@ -24062,7 +24061,6 @@ F:	tools/testing/selftests/ftrace/
>  TRACING MMIO ACCESSES (MMIOTRACE)
>  M:	Steven Rostedt <rostedt@goodmis.org>
>  M:	Masami Hiramatsu <mhiramat@kernel.org>
> -R:	Karol Herbst <karolherbst@gmail.com>
>  R:	Pekka Paalanen <ppaalanen@gmail.com>
>  L:	linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org
>  L:	nouveau@lists.freedesktop.org
> -- 
> 2.48.1
>