That sounds like a (hopefully) unlikely situation. If we’re getting to a point where the absolute minimum number of SC members are participating and most of them are abstaining, then I think the main issue at hand is a fundamental problem with the health of the committee and not how we’re counting abstentions.
That being said, I do feel strongly that the abstain should count towards quorum. It’s a way to signal that the committee member was present but defers to the majority for the final decision. Otherwise, I don’t think there’s much of a point in having it as an option at all if it doesn’t count towards anything.
(Sidenote)
FWIW, The Fedora Engineering Steering Committee (FESCo) (I am not on FESCo but am subject to its decisions as a Fedora developer) has an abstain option that counts towards quorum, but I don’t see it used much, except in the case of lack of expertise to make an informed decision (rare) or in the case of very controversial votes or both-options-are-bad situations.
I agree, if only for the fact that it makes counting votes on Discourse easier because its polls show the percentage for each option, and it’s easier to just say that yays have to equal at least 50% of the votes.
Good point. I was also thinking about not feeling impartial or avoiding conflicts of interest as a reason to abstain. I guess requiring members to leave a comment explaining why they abstained would go against that goal. Someone may have a personal reason for not voting or have a conflict of interest that they don’t want to or cannot (for whatever reason) post on a public forum.
Also, I would lean towards not adding abstain to community polls, as I feel they’d only add confusion since the community votes don’t count towards the majority, but maybe someone else feels differently.