Asklemmy

Well, what do you think? I personally can't see any problems with other words in my router like "Static IPv4 Routes", "DNS Settings", "Exclude interface", "Static Leases", "Port Forwards". And I don't know of any substantial grey area. So I don't share your fear of things getting out of hand. Please correct me if I'm wrong.

I think the words do not originate from something connected with race. It's just that it's the old stereotype of white = positive/good; black = negative. And these terms are technically inferior (because less descriptive) and if it reminds someone of their skin color, I'm okay with re-thinking things. Mind: this has been my impetus for questioning the terms in the first place, not the reason or argument to change them.

I don't like black and white thinking anyways. People always want simple categories, want to know if something is good or evil. Things have to be clear opposites. And in real-life most things are somewhere in-between and if you really think about it, it's often not either or. And having the same concept everywhere just reinforces that kind of stupid thinking in categories and in opposites. So it automatically resonated with me once people suggested to change things. Also I might for example like to take a walk in the cold breeze of the night and enjoy the concept of dark/black and everything is completely arbitraty.

It doesn't even work for this simple example in the clear and mathematical world of computers. There is the black and white, but you also have greylisting. Everything depends on context once you go into detail. Maybe you accept some kind of network packets from internally, but drop them once the originate somewhere outside of your own network. And your firewall will use yet other terms like ACCEPT and DROP.

And that's where I think "it ends". Never. I'm a progressive. I'm ready to advance things forwards once there is a better proposal. I judge things based on facts. I care about consequences. I'm ready to listen to people on a case-by-case basis. I won't be butthurt because 'omg, woke people want to change my language, and language should never change'. I like to argue about facts. They're either true or false and you're free to voice your objections. We gather the new ideas and then do a cost-benefit analysis. If you're smart, you're taking this as a basis to make a decision and go with it.

And since you're asking. I'm also a proponent of changing master/slave, because for some people these words really have a negative connotation to them. And it's more or less a no-brainer to slowly phase them out and replace them with something like primary/secondary or main/worker or replica. Interestingly enough, this really has something to do with race in the US, but preceeds Black Lives Matter. I do not know of any other controversies. Feel free to contact me if you see any issues with terms like 'grey area' or 'blackout', 'zombie processes' or 'kill children when the parent process died'. We can discuss this but my main concern is to move forward and create something. I'm ready to listen to proper arguments. I'm not part of the conservative people who want to argue all day and want to know what happens in this or that hypothetical scenario. If there is an actual problem with a technical term, please approach me and I'll listen. Otherwise please keep quiet.

Is that a sane approach? Do you think those are valid arguments?

(I'm really okay with it. I have to abide by style guidelines which say how many spaces or tabs of indentation in my code and where to put my return statement. I can live with another style guideline that says avoid this word and replace it with a more appropriate term. In my eyes we should have a few funny inside jokes that are politically incorrect. It's important not to be dead serious all the time. But most of the time language should be precise and effective.)