Re: About the use of the terms master/slave and blacklist, proposal to replace.

I might suggest that we at least confine any renaming to things that are user-visible and not worry about the source code. Except they're going to need aliases for all time, that's just a fact. Although I'm all about addressing the injustices of the past and present, I think it would be a lot more productive to spend our effort on future naming. I have pretty different connotations for "blacklist" anyway, seeing it less as an exclude pattern and more of a "never allow this because it's really bad if you do". Like the blacklisted keys unix distros keep after that a critical security bug in ssh a ways back. Let's look forward AND backward, but mostly forward. And with my awesome rhetorical skills, I single handedly put this matter to bed, right? ;) --c On Mon, Jun 15, 2020 at 3:12 PM Daniel Rodrigues Lima <danielrodrigues-ti@hotmail.com> wrote: > > Hi Larry, > > I appreciate your answer, thank you, but i would like to clarify some points: > > 1. I found 170 occurrences of the term blacklist - grep -rni "blacklist" php-src/, > i'm working to understand the impact of changes; > > 2. It’s not about politics, i believe it’s about learning how to be better humans; > > 3. I fully agree; > > 4. Sometimes it's necessary "broken window policing"; > > 5. I truly recognize this, and respect above all. > > > However if the majority disagree with the changes it is not worth pursuing this discussion, and > I should not even write an RFC for that. > > -- > Cheers, > > Daniel Rodrigues > > https://twitter.com/geekcom2 > ________________________________ > De: Larry Garfield <larry@garfieldtech.com> > Enviado: segunda-feira, 15 de junho de 2020 17:21 > Para: php internals <internals@lists.php.net> > Assunto: Re: [PHP-DEV] About the use of the terms master/slave and blacklist, proposal to > replace. > > On Mon, Jun 15, 2020, at 2:11 PM, G. P. B. wrote: > > On Mon, 15 Jun 2020 at 20:05, Lynn <kjarli@gmail.com> wrote: > > > > > On Mon, Jun 15, 2020 at 7:46 PM Alain D D Williams <addw@phcomp.co.uk> > > > wrote: > > > > > > > It is very easy to take offence when none is meant at all. One needs to > > > > look at intent. > > > > > > > > > > Hi, > > > > > > I'm going to disagree here. It's not about intent, it's about impact. > > > You > > > can have the best intentions with the worst results. > > > > > > When I read the replies here, it makes me sad. The comments come from a > > > place of white privilege and I'm sad to see that's how people think about > > > it. > > > > > > Regards, > > > Lynn > > > > > > > What saddens me is that these terms are non issues, and think they do > > something for "good" when it's just a pat on the back without doing any > > tangible change to the world. > > > > Case in point, from what I've seen mostly going around in the French > > community [1] is that the people who are actually concerned think it's > > woke and completely nonsensical. And I could argue the white-privelege > > here is to discuss these matters and imagine they would improve something. > > > > For blacklist/whitelist the benefit of changing it is that we can use more > > descriptive terminology such as deny/block/disallow and their opposite > > depending on context, which probably is more accessible to non-native > > English speakers. And if one wants to change it this should be the angle. > > > > However, I would argue that *if* when someone hears the word black the > > first thing which comes to their mind is race, then that makes them more > > of a racist and not the other people who use this with the well defined > > meaning. As such I would argue this is undermining the meaning of the > > word and pushing us towards an orwellian [2] state of the world. > > > > Moreover, black does not always mean something is "bad", see martial > > arts where a black belt is synonymous with experience and a white belt > > means that you are a novice. > > > > So instead of taking offence on behalf of a whole group and proposing > > changes which don't affect said group in any meaningful way while > > causing BC. Because if we decided to accept doing this, I shall start > > being offended about the usage of the word string as in French string > > means a thong and I imagine French women to be outraged that we > > (predominantly white males) casually talk about splitting or comparing > > strings. > > > > Best > > > > George P. Banyard > > > > [1] > > https://twitter.com/jesuisundev/status/1269260740894117890 > > [2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oe64p-QzhNE > > I am so going to regret being in this thread, but... > > > Data point: My boss at work noted earlier that he'd reached out to some black women he > knows to get their take; their response to him was that blacklist/whitelist did bother them, but > "master branch" did not. > > Of course, with GitHub now deciding to change its standards that is going to percolate to the > rest of the industry sooner or later, regardless of whether it's a good idea or a stupid waste > of time. It's going to happen now.. > > It should be noted that a person saying "I am offended" does not, in fact, make > something automatically offensive, or that you should always assume that their position is right, or > justified, or that you should take action as a result. As evidence, I cite that I find "Native > American" offensive because it implies one group of people is truly "from" a place > rightly, and no one else is no matter how long they've been here; that's despite the fact > that every group of people everywhere in history has moved around, a lot, and no one is > "native" to anywhere if you go back far enough, and genetic groups and cultural groups > migrate independently of each other (much as we like to to pretend otherwise). In fact the term > isn't even preferred by the people it refers to[1]. But no one listens to me, because I'm > not in a group that's allowed to be offended. There's way more politics around > "offense" than anyone is willing to admit. (And that's not a left or right specific > issue.) > > Also, point of order to Ben: Free Software is political[2]. Open Source was very specifically > created to be the de-politicized, amoral version that companies could leverage without having to > bother with that ethics stuff. That's literally the history. It's also why I support > Free Software. (Note: That attempt is largely unsuccessful because *all* software is inherently > political, but credit where it's due, please.) > > Having been through these conversations multiple times before, I would urge everyone to keep in > mind the following: > > 1) As Nikita said, without an actionable todo item to discuss, there's nothing productive > to discuss. > > 2) If you are able to find a reason for a change other than "because it's offensive > not to," do it, and push that angle. Make the political angle secondary. It makes it more > palatable. > > 3) For the love of God, do not go into this or similar discussions assuming that anyone who > disagrees with you is a bad person. I know it's hard, especially on touchy topics, but that is > how communication dies. Wanting to change whitelist/blacklist does *not* make someone a > troublemaker just trying to cause trouble for little value. Opposing that same change does *not* > make someone racist, or uncaring, or "OMG privilege so we don't have to listen to > you," or whatever. I've seen that pattern appear way the hell too many times, and > it's toxic, and does nothing but poison communities. > > 4) Let's all understand that language changes like this are at best broken window > policing, and I use that term very deliberately. If you really care about addressing persistent > inequality in the world. get your butt out to a Black Lives Matter march, write your legislator, > join a reform group, work on hiring practices in your own company, or do something else that > requires actual work. That goes for everyone. > > 5) Acknowledge that there are very likely a lot of people on this list who are doing the things > in point 4 already, but still oppose the language changes. Whether you agree with them or not, > that's an acceptable and valid position for them to take. Please respect that. > > [1] https://youtu.be/kh88fVP2FWQ > [2] > https://peakd.com/programming/@crell/free-software-is-political > > --Larry Garfield > > -- > PHP Internals - PHP Runtime Development Mailing List > To unsubscribe, visit: http://www.php.net/unsub.php