31–40 of 162 posts
What does he mean that you can't say "fake news" on HN?
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17818978
Click on parent a few times to get the full background.
(I found that by searching for "antirez fake news" in comments, btw, I don't remember the conversation from the time it actually took place).
The problem I’m starting to see is that the continued use of phrases like this (master/slave, blacklist/whitelist) can be a constant reminder to some that they “don’t belong here.” Obviously, in this context, they aren’t meant to be racist; but they are a reminder that racism exists. The end result is that it makes more people feel unwanted and ultimately leave tech.
We start down that path and we'll end up banning "Paint it black" as a racist song.
I suspect this is one of those topics that at some point, everyone will have just switched terms because it's not worth the hassle to fight these fights over and over again. Kind of a "I'm not wrong, but is it a good use of 20 hours a year to argue about this?"
Maybe developers should steer clear of Twitter so they don't get exposed to the problem. The only winning move is not to play, much like with ads. You don't train yourself to ignore ads or to not be influenced by them, you just use an ad blocker.
I find the top comment to be the most insightful thing here, and wish everyone who is running these campaigns would read it.
Note that this is from 2018. I personally totally agree with the author. Anyone who chooses to be offended by words used in a totally different context is doing exactly that - choosing to be offended. If we keep going down this path of endless meaningless virtue signalling, where will we stop? Is the term "black hole" racist too? What about blackout? Etc, etc. No one really cares about these terms and it they do thei…
That has been objected to [1][2][3]. A white county commissioner described a slow office as a black hole for paperwork, a black county commissioner said that was racist and it should be called a white hole, and a black judge asked the first commissioner to apologize for his racist remark. Also, "angel food cake" and "devil's food cake" were also declared racist, apparently, in the same incident [3].
[1] https://www.discovermagazine.com/the-sciences/sometimes-a-bl...
[2] https://www.csmonitor.com/Commentary/Opinion/2008/0723/p09s0...
[3] https://www.npr.org/sections/newsandviews/2008/07/is_black_h...
I've read about a bunch of these renaming efforts in the past weeks and I think some of these are very justified while some of them seem to take it further than necessary. The master/slave naming seems clearly outdated to me and this one is a direct reference to slavery. A better word like replica exists so I'm using that instead. This makes a lot of sense. On the other hand there's efforts to rename white/black list…
The easy one is that we don't want to argue about it, much likes tabs vs spaces - the value for us is in having a standard, not necessarily what the standard is.
The other one is that I spend a ton of time convincing developers to be intentional and deliberate in their naming of variables and functions, and these terms just aren't very intentional. I've had to explain them to several ESL developers because it isn't intuitive.
The problem I’m starting to see is that the continued use of phrases like this (master/slave, blacklist/whitelist) can be a constant reminder to some that they “don’t belong here.” Obviously, in this context, they aren’t meant to be racist; but they are a reminder that racism exists. The end result is that it makes more people feel unwanted and ultimately leave tech.
I don't mean to be rude or belittle someone's feelings, but isn't that pretty much a sign of being mentally unwell? "This text uses blacklist to mean a list of words not being allowed. My skin is brown. This is a dog whistle to racists and a reminder that I am not welcome in tech" sounds like something that signals a need for therapy and potentially medication, not a rewrite of the documentation.