'Master' and 'slave': Tech terms face scrutiny amid anti-racism efforts

[Cerebus]

Ofcourse you could go for 'controller' and 'obeyer'

The thing about 'master/slave', which most of the alternatives seem to fall down on, is that they roll off the tongue easily. Two syllables is the max we want, purely because any longer than that will want to get shortened in usage. They are also very different in the way they are said and written - you can easily tell they are different just from looking at someone saying them even if you don't (consciously) lipread. So, for instance, a previous suggestion of 'controller/controlled' would be real bad on just these counts, and since they differ only in one letter - and the last one at that - I can't imagine the pair being a suitable alternative. Most alternatives suffer similar problems.

Controller/controllee would keep then in the same case, and yes, I've lost count of the times that I have seen words that are so similar confused e.g adsorption and absorption.

[james_s]

Every time this comes up it makes me think of George Carlin's skit on euphemisms.

[pepelevamp]

Unfortunately, a substantial and powerful segment of society view high profits as their entitlement above all else, and therefore feel empowered to take it upon themselves to basically bring near slavery -  well actually a close facsimile of it, back.

And they are doing so, largely under the radar. One of the ways its being accomplished is dividing people so they cannot have important discussions we need to be having about the nature of work, the reason why businesses exist and what is and is not a reasonable level of profit. The result will be an outcome literally none of us want or would have voted for. A prevention of the bright future that a few years ago seemed assuredly ahead of us an in view.

So I urge people to not fall for the framings that attempt to put forward this trivalization of what is a real, serious problem, if some people have issues they feel they need to see addressed, its not going to kill us to try to figure out how those issues can be accomodated. If we dont, we're falling into a very cynical trap - the result of which will be horrible for all of us.

(here is a link to one big cause of many problems, nicely formatted for printing, worth downloading)

(Hierarchies and high functioning professionalism don't mix well, IMHO. Professionals want to do quality work, and that might conflict with pressure to lower costs to the bone, behavior consistent with a push to extract the most possible profit out of any situation)

The idea that work might occur for other reasons than just money, or that workers might be something more than interchangeable commodities to be traded internationally, and nothing more, - as well as all laws that might support job security and improving standards threatens some people, science threatens some people, and its in all of our best interests to try to rise above bigotry, blind profiteering, and "thought terminating cliches" so we can get on with doing good work, if we dont we may find that there is no longer professionalism at all, for anybody, just a race to the bottom. 

We're being browbeaten into not seeing the big picture, that we can choose the future we want, do we want a rational future where society brings out the best in everybody or a struggle against one another for the means of existence that leaves everybody so exhausted we cant climb out of the hole it digs us into. Nobody wins that struggle.

The one thing I don't understand is how the terms "master" and "slave" can ever be deemed to be racist. Anyone who believes they are, is ignorant about history, especially African history.

The black lives matter campaigners are upset about how African history and the atrocities committed by the British Empire are not taught in UK schools, which I agree with: African history and the gross human rights violations of the colonial era do need to be taught in school. If you actually take just a few minutes to research the real history of Africa, you'll find is that slavery was endemic to the continent, long before the white European invasion. Black people enslaved other black people, the same as white Europeans enslaved other white people, way before the colonial era. Africa was not some peaceful, eutopian, harmonious, continent, before white people took over and ruined it. There were wars, atrocities and empires for thousands of years before European conquest.

I'm not defending my ancestors, who profited from slavery and should have known better, but no one can take the moral high-ground regarding slavery. The only reason why Europeans managed to dominate and pillage Africa was because they were technically advanced at the time. We saw a similar thing in Africa: look at how successful the technically advanced Egyptians were.

We need to eliminate racism, xenophobia and bigotry from society, but changing technical terminology will not make any difference and will only promote current misunderstandings of history and slavery.

Its not bigotry to demand that working people such as engineers earn a decent wage, nomatter where they are from. Even if their own employers want to pay them less, it shouldnt be allowed. Not allowing it is not discrimination. (thats what some developing countries are claiming, a right to basically enslave their own workers at the lowest wages imaginable should be their entitlement under trade instruments)  the WTO wants to take over this kind of work, that would be a disaster and likely would set us back a hundred years or more as far as racism, as it will result in large scale job losses to favor the new dirt cheap firms and their hugely underpaid work forces. tahst what the real goal of dividing everybody is, quietly creating conditions so that the middle class can literally be eliminated by very low wage migrant, hi skilled labor, also capturing immigration. To my way of thinking, actual immigration is good, but what we'll get instead is a new form of slavery, where peoples presence in a couuntry is tied to a job and if they lose it they have to pack up and leave, keeping them in limbo, and most significantly, keeping them making very low wages for many many yesrs, even decades or more) . Thats why people are trying to divide everybody everywhere. they have a financial motive. Anyway, thats why I plea, lets rise above our predjuidices so we can have intelligent discussions, otherwise, we're going to lose our middlc class jobs, everywhere..

This. This is what it all comes down to. People trying to get rich on the backs of others. Unlivable wages is the new slavery. Unfortunately the race to the bottom erodes everything when you have economies which are inter-dependent.  The true fight against this is so enormous & almost impossible to even conceive. Its easy to create smaller fights & win tiny battles against people online using wrong words than it is to accomplish the end-goal & steer things.

But the marches at the moment are indeed trying to push back against the extremely lop-sided wealth. Provided folks like you and I and others here can put in effort to contribute & help turn the steering wheel of this car, we just might have a chance.

As you say - the biggest problem is that people are unaware of how the game is even run. Some are. For one thing people definitely feel the pain. Its just a difficult thing to articulate fully because its such a huge monster.

[Mechatrommer]

another time-wasting issue raised by 5th world class mentality... now find another word for this color without being racist. you can keep go on and on until the world ends


ps: master/slave is ok for devices, but not ok for people. just as its ok when we say platipus is a "stupid" animal. but when you say it to human, its an insult. what matters is what the word is associated with, whats its meant, not the word itself, esp when its describing the proper attribute. now go find another word for "stupid" when we try to associate with non human, so it will not be an insult when it is said (even to a platipus) urgh this is sickening.

since at it fyi, i am a bit insulted when "he" or "she" is used on animal since i'm not an animal. but billions of people out there dont care, they can happily associate themselves. 

[tom66]

Controller/controllee would keep then in the same case, and yes, I've lost count of the times that I have seen words that are so similar confused e.g adsorption and absorption.

One character off for a typo though, easy to mix up roles.
'Pri' and 'Sec' work better, IMO, if you are going to pick an alternative.

I3C is a new MIPI spec, v1.1 formalised last year, to replace I2C, and it still uses master and slave.

So I think any worry over these terms disappearing is... excessive.

[Simon]

To be clear, this discussion is academic. The terms are not going away. If the SJW nutjobs complain and I do call them nutjobs and SJW for a reason then this is what i say: First they are Social Justice Warriors, they are warriors because they go round picking fights and worse they pick fights on behalf of people who never asked for the fight to be picked. If they care so much why are they doing their best to erase history by removing words and statues when the problem they are trying to erase is alive and well and worse than ever before. Slavery has not gone away, so why are we trying to wipe it from peoples minds?

These people just want a cause to fight for and will go on and on until they are standing on their own in the wilderness of what is left of the world they have inadvertently destroyed still yelling at the tops of their voice unaware that they have nothing left to control.

I left the green Party precisely because I was seeing less and less engaging of brains and more and more engaging in token gestures for things that required a far more complex solutions.

[tggzzz]

People that worry about inanimate objects being referred to as master/slave should consider a very commonplace dehumanisation that is found in most companies.

Companies used to have personel departments that dealt with persons.

Now companies have human resources departments that deal with things to be bought, depreciated, and discarded.

[Simon]

People that worry about inanimate objects being referred to as master/slave should consider a very commonplace dehumanisation that is found in most companies.

Companies used to have personel departments that dealt with persons.

Now companies have human resources departments that deal with things to be bought, depreciated, and discarded.

Quite. The one problem i have with my employer is that i am not valued as a person and no one is, the chips are down? right kick the latest employees out, why the latest? because making the useless ones that have festered with the company for years redundant costs more, the fact that the newer ones may be mare usefull is irrelevant.

Oh Simon, you bought yourself a nice new piece of equipment, you had the decency to show us it to help us understand what we too should buy so that you can actually do your job effectively, that's lovely, when will you bring your one in so that we don't have to buy one ourselves, yes that's right, we expect underpaid employees to bankroll our multi million pound company.

Yes sir, such a pleasure to work for you and be treated like crap and taken for granted, but it's OK we will stop using the word slave to show how much we care.......

We live in an age of precarious employment where at the lower end people are just objects and people thing that documenting processes for dumb employees to follow is the key to success instead of employing competent people and letting them do good work and making sure they want to stay.

Of all the people furloughed how many had the 20% the government was not paying made up? none! they just took the free cash and said fuck you employee, deal with it. But it's OK we have to worry about the words we use so as to not offend the fragile minded.

[GeorgeOfTheJungle]

And we keep buying everything in China => it will only get worse.

[nuclearcat]

To be clear, this discussion is academic. The terms are not going away. If the SJW nutjobs complain and I do call them nutjobs and SJW for a reason then this is what i say: First they are Social Justice Warriors, they are warriors because they go round picking fights and worse they pick fights on behalf of people who never asked for the fight to be picked. If they care so much why are they doing their best to erase history by removing words and statues when the problem they are trying to erase is alive and well and worse than ever before. Slavery has not gone away, so why are we trying to wipe it from peoples minds?

These people just want a cause to fight for and will go on and on until they are standing on their own in the wilderness of what is left of the world they have inadvertently destroyed still yelling at the tops of their voice unaware that they have nothing left to control.

I left the green Party precisely because I was seeing less and less engaging of brains and more and more engaging in token gestures for things that required a far more complex solutions.

I dont think it is right to call them "SJW nutjobs" and put labels.
I always hope there are a lot of people who are simply doing mistakes, especially if they are not attacking someone.
Although it’s hard for me to understand what motivates a person who has never suffered from racism, decide for those who have suffered from it and change a few words in non-essential parts of the code. What is their desire? Fame? Checkmark "fought for social justice"?
Then, well, slaves in the Libyan slave markets sighed freely and say - "now we really feel better, because golang and python dont have less word slave". Oh, sorry, i remember, they can’t be called like that now, is this word now called, "s-word"? or "people who is being exploited for free labor and being sold as property"?
For example person who submit changes in golang Filippo Valsorda, i am following him in twitter, https://twitter.com/FiloSottile , quite talented guy, bright mind (probably thats my illusion, taking in consideration this cosmetic changes in golang he did lately).
It would be much more useful if one of those programmers who change words did not create a storm in a glass and change few words, but for example collaborate in creation of an application or way to report about their problem for workers from Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Ethiopia, etc. - who often come to work in Asia and Middle East as housekeepers, but find themselves locked up in slavery, and unable to communicate and report about their problem. This problem need really good brainstorming and bright minds.

[Simon]

You have to label things, if you can't put a label on something it's impossible to have a sensible high level discussion. You need enough labels with the caveat that everyone is still an individual but if you have to make a different assertion for everyone on the planet then you will spend all of the time acknowledging their individuality but won't have time to deal with the issue.

You have to group similar people so that you can describe and deal with their demands or you will just acknowledge everyone one by one and do nothing - and then you are still in trouble.

[tom66]

My sister is a bit of an SJW.  I think their heart is in the right place.  They generally want to make the world a better place.  But they are often wrong about the dynamics.

[Simon]

My sister is a bit of an SJW.  I think their heart is in the right place.  They generally want to make the world a better place.  But they are often wrong about the dynamics.

The problem is they find a small irrelevant thing that is associated with the "problem" and then go bazerk about it to the point that the actual problem get's forgotten. They want simple things to change and then they think their work is done when they have done nothing.

[bd139]

SJW is someone who helps without being asked to. People don’t like being helped if they haven’t asked. The problem with society is when people ask for help and no one answers. The differences are subtle but important. The worst situation for all is when a cause is formed when someone has already answered by people who are forcing their help on others.

[coppice]

People that worry about inanimate objects being referred to as master/slave should consider a very commonplace dehumanisation that is found in most companies.

Companies used to have personel departments that dealt with persons.

Now companies have human resources departments that deal with things to be bought, depreciated, and discarded.

Human resources is such an honest name. Its very rare to see such honesty in business these days. The name should be dehumanising, as that's what their function is.

[coppice]

SJW is someone who helps without being asked to. People don’t like being helped if they haven’t asked. The problem with society is when people ask for help and no one answers. The differences are subtle but important. The worst situation for all is when a cause is formed when someone has already answered by people who are forcing their help on others.

An SJW is someone who forces help on people, whether they want it or not, and whether they agree with its direction or not. If the sucker doesn't agree, they are subject to abuse from the SJW.

[bd139]

That’s fair.

[wraper]

SJW is someone who helps without being asked to. People don’t like being helped if they haven’t asked. The problem with society is when people ask for help and no one answers. The differences are subtle but important. The worst situation for all is when a cause is formed when someone has already answered by people who are forcing their help on others.

More like think they are helping in their twisted mind. More often than not they are only making things worse both to whom they are supposedly 'helping' and against whom they do so. In other words the only thing they usually produce is mess and leave it to others to deal with.

[nctnico]

SJW is someone who helps without being asked to. People don’t like being helped if they haven’t asked. The problem with society is when people ask for help and no one answers. The differences are subtle but important. The worst situation for all is when a cause is formed when someone has already answered by people who are forcing their help on others.

More like think they are helping in their twisted mind. More often than not they are only making things worse both to whom they are supposedly 'helping' and against whom they do so. In other words the only thing they usually produce is mess and leave it to others to deal with.

I agree. There is a fine line between telling someone he/she will never get far because of their looks versus needing to take a step extra to achieve something. On top of that it is always easy to blame something you can't do anything about for your failures. But maybe I'm politically incorrect right now so that is corrected by adding this statement.

[tggzzz]

People that worry about inanimate objects being referred to as master/slave should consider a very commonplace dehumanisation that is found in most companies.

Companies used to have personel departments that dealt with persons.

Now companies have human resources departments that deal with things to be bought, depreciated, and discarded.

Human resources is such an honest name. Its very rare to see such honesty in business these days. The name should be dehumanising, as that's what their function is.

Ah, but which came first? The name change occurred in the mid-80s and was, I get the strong impression that the objective was to allow management to think of the people as disposable, whereas previously they hadn't.

I've worked for two companies with good HR departments that actively helped their employees: CCL and HP. One was in the early 80s, one was famously a "Theory Y" company before that concept had even been invented.

[coppice]

People that worry about inanimate objects being referred to as master/slave should consider a very commonplace dehumanisation that is found in most companies.

Companies used to have personel departments that dealt with persons.

Now companies have human resources departments that deal with things to be bought, depreciated, and discarded.

Human resources is such an honest name. Its very rare to see such honesty in business these days. The name should be dehumanising, as that's what their function is.

Ah, but which came first? The name change occurred in the mid-80s and was, I get the strong impression that the objective was to allow management to think of the people as disposable, whereas previously they hadn't.

I've worked for two companies with good HR departments that actively helped their employees: CCL and HP. One was in the early 80s, one was famously a "Theory Y" company before that concept had even been invented.

Staff have always been treated as a commodity by the management of most companies. I don't think a change of name affects that. My impression, when these departments changed name, was that management really though they were changing to a cool trendy new name, and most employees were simply puzzled that the company was being more honest.

[Mechatrommer]

SJW as in Black Lives Matters is fine since there are few uneducated ignorant scumbags got loose into law enforcement task. but SJW as in we need to change tech master/slave term is plain stupid. but then try to change whitelist/blacklist also seems reasonable to me as there is no particular reason why white must be good and black is bad in the first place (sometime white is bad just as sometime black is good).

[Simon]

SJW as in Black Lives Matters is fine since there are few uneducated ignorant scumbags got loose into law enforcement task. but SJW as in we need to change tech master/slave term is plain stupid. but then try to change whitelist/blacklist also seems reasonable to me as there is no particular reason why white must be good and black is bad in the first place (sometime white is bad just as sometime black is good).

Yes, in accounting you are in the black or in the red.

[Jeroen3]

Github and Gitlab gave in. Since apparently you shouldn't name the default branch master anymore.

[bd139]

As I think I mentioned elsewhere, we now have to do this in at least 1000 places:

if branch in ['master', 'main'] ...

Fuck whoever came up with this shit. Gitlab and Github now use proprietary forks of Git thus are not git. Comedy gold because one is run by microsoft so embrace EXTEND extinguish with SJW's cheering it on.

Github are fucking cancerous anyway. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GitHub#Controversies

Oh and github are entirely 100% unnecessary to use git.

Git mailing list thread: https://public-inbox.org/git/9accf436-4b7a-2de2-de79-e81ec090dfc9@gmail.com/T/#ma9a4da070ddf8ff87729960bb31ce2a8776c73c1