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

[james_s]

They claimed that because she didn't say Jewish but Israel that she was not racist, but they were not heard out.  *This* is the consequence of your decision to permit absolutely no ambiguity or fine-grain decision making.  It's quite beautiful.

I didn't think either "Jewish" or "Israel" were races?    Am I taking the term "race" too literally? Did I miss a memo?

[Sal Ammoniac]

If I was in their shoes, I would probably have a rebellious attitude.

And so the cycle self-perpetuates...

[james_s]

I wonder if for many Americans a focus on black vs white is a way of diverting their minds from just how gruesome the history of America has been. Just focus on one area of injustice, and ignore all the rest. What about the genecide of indigenous Americans? What about the waves of Chinese tricked into going to the western side of America with the promise of good jobs? What they found were indentured servitude conditions building the railroads, or working in mines in Arizona that would have made the actual slaves think "man, those people REALLY have it tough". What about the workers in northern industrial towns who couldn't be motivated to fight slavery, because they thought the slaves had better conditions than they did? When there was a downturn the factory workers starved on the streets, while a slave owner needed to keep his assets in good shape for the next upturn.

Every nation has its dark era, some more recently than others, I do not think America is unique here. Even today there are countries where slavery currently exists, where genocide is taking place, lands have been conquered and conquered again by other nations/tribes. I'm not suggesting we ignore these things or pretend they never happened, or that because another country did it that makes it ok, but it's a bit silly to suggest that one nation has a dark past while others do not.

[coppice]

I wonder if for many Americans a focus on black vs white is a way of diverting their minds from just how gruesome the history of America has been. Just focus on one area of injustice, and ignore all the rest. What about the genecide of indigenous Americans? What about the waves of Chinese tricked into going to the western side of America with the promise of good jobs? What they found were indentured servitude conditions building the railroads, or working in mines in Arizona that would have made the actual slaves think "man, those people REALLY have it tough". What about the workers in northern industrial towns who couldn't be motivated to fight slavery, because they thought the slaves had better conditions than they did? When there was a downturn the factory workers starved on the streets, while a slave owner needed to keep his assets in good shape for the next upturn.

Every nation has its dark era, some more recently than others, I do not think America is unique here. Even today there are countries where slavery currently exists, where genocide is taking place, lands have been conquered and conquered again by other nations/tribes. I'm not suggesting we ignore these things or pretend they never happened, or that because another country did it that makes it ok, but it's a bit silly to suggest that one nation has a dark past while others do not.

The only unique thing about the US is it has moved so rapidly from a period of sustained darkness to a modern affluent era where people have nothing better to do than muse over a dark past they cannot change.

[SkyMaster]

If I was in their shoes, I would probably have a rebellious attitude.

And so the cycle self-perpetuates...

The initial "cycle" was perpetuated during 350 years, it is possible that the reaction then self perpetuate for 350 years, in order to reach equilibrium.

See you in year 2325.

 

[Sal Ammoniac]

The initial "cycle" was perpetuated during 350 years, it is possible that the reaction then self perpetuate for 350 years, in order to reach equilibrium.

To use an electronics analogy, there's too much positive feedback in this system and it's gone into oscillation. We need to apply negative feedback to dampen out the osciallations.

[Nominal Animal]

I can elaborate on that but for this topic it suffices to say that IMHO the situation of your parents while raising kids is very important in how these kids stand in life, and even then when they become adults they have to choose, do I want to be a victim and play that role or do I want to do everything I can to make it.

Fully agreed.

It becomes very difficult to discuss statistics, if statistics related to ethnicity are considered "scientific racism".

In the USA, "The strongest predictor of whether a person will end up in prison, is that they were raised by a single parent” ("Father Absence and Youth Incarceration" paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Sociological Association, San Francisco, CA, 1998, by C.C. Harper and S.S. McLanahan.)
Now, a disproportionate fraction of African-Americans are born to single mothers.  There have been papers showing how the racial disparities in crime have tracked the prevalence of single parents in the twentieth century, but unfortunately I can't find any references right now.

Is it racist to point this out?  Many believe it is.  Here in Finland, there is no discussion about this (statistics between criminality and single parent upbringing) at all, because it is considered to be victimizing single parents, who already have it rough.  You know, intersectional feminism being a government policy now and all.

Culture, and especially how it affects the concept of family or raising kids, is something we should be allowed to criticize, so that we could find ways to help families bring up capable, stable individuals, and not disgruntled racial activists or social justice warriors or hikikomoris.

This is also why the concept of "multiculturalism" is unworkable in practice.  The core of each human culture is the shared moral values and expected behaviour, and most humans cannot just switch between different sets based on who they are interacting with.  (This is also the true reason why people want to live amongst others they consider "like them": it is not about looking the same, it is about having the same core rules and expectations on social behaviour.)
The unavoidable end results of multiculturalism and social justice are exactly the same: division, fracturing societies into small tribes with their own internal rules.
It is supposed to be "all about ethnic foods and nice gaming sessions" (as a Finnish politician put it ), but you don't need multiculturalism for people of different backgrounds to live together: you just need a shared core set of rules and moral values – a shared core culture, or basis –, on top of which everyone is welcome to add their own flavour on top.
Just like you don't need word policing to ensure productive, mutually beneficial interaction between humans: you just need to teach people to handle their own emotions without getting into a frenzy or falling into a catatonic state, and to solve conflicts via organized discussion (and not a shouting match or cancellation demands). Sometimes honest discussion hurts, but if it is important, it tends to be well worth it.

[SkyMaster]

The only unique thing about the US is...

coppice, you were asking yourself a question. I provided a possible answer. But we should not rub it in.

No countries have a perfectly clean history.

Personally, I like United States (not every day, but most of the time  ).

 

[Fred Basset]

You must be young.

What do you think of the colloquial name for three-prong pliers, as indicated on Wholesale Engineering Supplies webpage?

Or people being told to push a button by the phrase "push the tit".

And then there are names for Thinkpad's "red dot mouse". One is close to the button, another is close to the pliers. No, I am not going to engage in discussion of that topic!

My Dad had a pair of them for applying stretchy sleeves with letters and numbers on them over wires to identify the cable they would become when the connector was fitted.  Always wondered what they were called.  Thank you for solving that litle mini-mystery tggzzz.

Where would you even start with with "Towering Inferno", where the designer at the start of the movie is investigating why a power panel blew and he asks for a pair of "dykes" and is handed what looks like wire cutters, so he can take a sample of the overheated wire with him.

The problem to me seems to be about changing people's attitudes.  Legislation can only be a reminder that terms are no longer acceptable.  But some have been in common useage for so many years that change can only be through people wanting to be less 'crass' or triggering of other's bad memories.

Reading all of this reminds me of the arguments over wearing face masks against Covid-19.  They will not offer you much protection, but will protect others from you if you get it and are infectious long before you will even know you are ill.

[paulca]

You're referring to ONE specific case where I've yet to hear ANYONE defending what that police officer did.

Interesting as I am on the facebook of a US cop.... and his response was, "Saying you can't breathe means you can breathe"

Also when pushed, he stated, "Do what you are told, obey the police, don't try and run or resist and it will all be fine."... when pushed again he admitted this meant... if you don't do that, you'll be shot.

[tggzzz]

My Dad had a pair of them for applying stretchy sleeves with letters and numbers on them over wires to identify the cable they would become when the connector was fitted.  Always wondered what they were called.  Thank you for solving that litle mini-mystery tggzzz.

Where would you even start with with "Towering Inferno", where the designer at the start of the movie is investigating why a power panel blew and he asks for a pair of "dykes" and is handed what looks like wire cutters, so he can take a sample of the overheated wire with him.

Yes, that is what those pliers are used for.

"Dikes" is a fairly standard contraction of "diagonal cutters", but I usually call them cutters.

[Fred Basset]

I would like to clear up an apparently commonly-held beleif that if you can cry for help, you can breathe.  That is not true, and I know as it happened to me only yesterday.

I was in a hospital bed when my neck became twisted as a procedure was being performed.  I used the last of my breath to alert them and all was well. You can force air out with a lot more force than you can suck it in.  Just one reason alone is that when you try to breathe in, the walls of your airways can collapse as they are sucked in, but forcing air out opens them up due to the compression of the air forcing them apart.

Secondly, the muscles weaken as they are starved of oxygen, so those colapsing walls will collapse further as the patient nears unconsciouness.  That also can cause secondary blockages such as tongue swallowing.

It is absolutely not true to think that is someone can call for help, they are not suffocating.  The process can take several minutes as their bodies shut down.  Read about killers who strangle and they often say it takes 4 minutes or more to actually strangle their victims.

[EEVblog]

I would like to clear up an apparently commonly-held beleif that if you can cry for help, you can breathe.  That is not true, and I know as it happened to me only yesterday.

This discussion (and this entire page of responses) has absolutely nothing to do with this thread, please stay on topic everyone.
If people can't do this then I either lock the thread or I start deleting posts.

[nuclearcat]

Linux team approves new terminology, bans terms like 'blacklist' and 'slave'
https://www.zdnet.com/article/linux-team-approves-new-terminology-bans-terms-like-blacklist-and-slave/

I wonder if i submit new SPI device driver, and in specs of driver it is specified MISO/MOSI, they will force me to rename on their discreption to terms they see appropriate?
Bloody hell.

UPD:
https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux.git/commit/?id=49decddd39e5f6132ccd7d9fdc3d7c470b0061bb

+For symbol names and documentation, avoid introducing new usage of
+'master / slave' (or 'slave' independent of 'master') and 'blacklist /
+whitelist'.

It seems only symbol names and documentation. Still, documentation might be corner case...

[Simon]

Just ignore them, if they want people to write free software they will have to take what they get and like it.

[langwadt]

UPD:
https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux.git/commit/?id=49decddd39e5f6132ccd7d9fdc3d7c470b0061bb

+For symbol names and documentation, avoid introducing new usage of
+'master / slave' (or 'slave' independent of 'master') and 'blacklist /
+whitelist'.

It seems only symbol names and documentation. Still, documentation might be corner case...

as silly as the whole things is "avoid introducing new usage" is a helluva lot more reasonable than banned must
charge everything going back to the start of time

[Nominal Animal]

Just ignore them, if they want people to write free software they will have to take what they get and like it.

They're paid by companies, so they don't care.

What happens is that if you submit a bug fix, and it has a Bad Word in it, your submission will be completely ignored.
In the best case, someone else submits an essentially same bug fix without bad words, with zero reference to you or your original submission, and that gets included.
In the worst case, the bug remains open.

If you submit a new driver, none of the developers will consider it, due to the Bad Words in it.  Its merits won't matter.

I find this insane and offensive.  Who can I boycott? 

[Zero999]

I know all of that, but you've missed the point. It's no coincidence the word black, rather than African or even brown, were originally chosen to describe Africans, because it has negative connotations. Black animals are often seen as bad/evil, avoid black cats, the black sheep of the family etc.

It's stupid to talk about black and white people, because the terms aren't even descriptive! No one is black or white, but brown or pink.

No you have missed my point. It is a coincidence that African people were called black, and the association with evil. They were called black long before the idea of white supremacy. Historically races  mixed and treated equally. For example, a commander at a Roman camp in Britain was black. Of course, Romans thought their culture was superior, but the people who became Roman citizens was very broad.

It wasn't until Europeans were looking for excuses to go colonising and enslaving other continents, that the idea of white supremacy was created to justify it, backed up by bogus theology and science. The idea that Africans were called black because of association with evil is a modern retrofitting.

That's a load of bollocks. The English language didn't even exist in the Roman times and the human race has never ever been harmonious.

Europeans didn't really start to attempt to classify different races, until they were already enslaving Africans. Such attempts were clearly biased and are regarded as scientific racism nowadays. Saharan Africans were given the term Negroid (derived from Negro, which is Spanish for black) and deemed to be inferior to whites. It's makes no sense that the words nigger and Negro are deemed to be racist, whilst black isn't, when it means the same thing.

Even if we stick with black as purely a descriptive term for skin colour, which it isn't, as no one naturally has black skin, but dark brown, it would still make a lot more sense to stop using it to describe people, than to cleanse the English language of all instances of the word black used in a negative context.

[Ed.Kloonk]

The irony is telling a 'white' person what they cannot say.

[coppice]

Europeans didn't really start to attempt to classify different races, until they were already enslaving Africans.

When did Europeans actually enslave Africans? We know Europeans have a history of enslaving each other. We know people from the Barbary Coast enslaved a lot of Europeans. Europeans generally bought pre-enslaved Africans and traded and used them. The actual enslavers are still in business enslaving and selling their neighbours today. North America is a real odd man out historically, where the slave owners and slaves were generally easy to tell apart. Even the steady flow of black slaves into North Africa didn't create such a clear skin colour divide. It also didn't leave much of a black population, as it appears they castrated all their male slaves. Nobody cares about race when there's money to be made.

[SiliconWizard]

Almost all countries in the world with enough power did enslave some people at some point in history, african countries themselves being no exception.

Whereas slavery and races have fundamentally little to do with one another, the "race" argument has been used for justifying it - among many other arguments. Reality is much simpler than this. People have been enslaving other people not because the latter deserved it, or that it would have been their "purpose", in any way. They just did it because they could. As simple as that. And you can do that at some point because you have more "power" than them one way or another. That's really all there is to it IMHO.

To make it look morally acceptable, some societies (particularly western societies) have used the backwards idea that if they were *able* to enslave some people, then those people were thus "weaker", and in a twisted line of reasoning, thus less of humans than them. This of course is all bullshit reasoning: the end of the line is that they were just looking for free workers that they just had to feed to keep going, just like animals. A corollary is that since slaves were treated as animals, then they were SEEN as ones, also a backwards idea.

[Ed.Kloonk]

Have a gander at Dubai and the perceived treatment of workers from the sub-continent. Compare that to situation in America. I find the whole 'master' eradication thing offensive. A master is someone you can learn a lot from.

[Nominal Animal]

To make it look morally acceptable, some societies (particularly western societies) have used the backwards idea that if they were *able* to enslave some people, then those people were thus "weaker", and in a twisted line of reasoning, thus less of humans than them.

And, it has never been a completely unanimous decision in any society, either, so demanding repentance from members of a society that at some point in history did allow slavery, is just fallacious.

My favourite poet, William Blake, was a vocal proponent of equality, and deeply opposed to slavery, for example.  Some of his contemporaries considered him odd ("idiosyncratic" is the word used), some progressive; some agreed, some disagreed with him.

In regions where slavery still exists, there are many locals who are trying to end the practice.  The reason their commendable efforts don't get much support from social justice enthusiasts and Western countries in general, is that because the oppressors are also non-white, it would be "racist" and "<culture>-phobic" for whites to try and intervene.

It is obvious that the people demanding "master" and "slave" not be used are not offended by slavery per se, and are only interested in trying to score Twatter points by pointing out how ashamed of and offended they are by past white slavery.  Dummies.  Regrettable placeholders for humans, those people are.

[Zero999]

Europeans didn't really start to attempt to classify different races, until they were already enslaving Africans.

When did Europeans actually enslave Africans? We know Europeans have a history of enslaving each other. We know people from the Barbary Coast enslaved a lot of Europeans. Europeans generally bought pre-enslaved Africans and traded and used them. The actual enslavers are still in business enslaving and selling their neighbours today. North America is a real odd man out historically, where the slave owners and slaves were generally easy to tell apart. Even the steady flow of black slaves into North Africa didn't create such a clear skin colour divide. It also didn't leave much of a black population, as it appears they castrated all their male slaves. Nobody cares about race when there's money to be made.

Sorry, I don't see any moral difference between Europeans enslaving others or buying slaves.

To make it look morally acceptable, some societies (particularly western societies) have used the backwards idea that if they were *able* to enslave some people, then those people were thus "weaker", and in a twisted line of reasoning, thus less of humans than them.

And, it has never been a completely unanimous decision in any society, either, so demanding repentance from members of a society that at some point in history did allow slavery, is just fallacious.

My favourite poet, William Blake, was a vocal proponent of equality, and deeply opposed to slavery, for example.  Some of his contemporaries considered him odd ("idiosyncratic" is the word used), some progressive; some agreed, some disagreed with him.

In regions where slavery still exists, there are many locals who are trying to end the practice.  The reason their commendable efforts don't get much support from social justice enthusiasts and Western countries in general, is that because the oppressors are also non-white, it would be "racist" and "<culture>-phobic" for whites to try and intervene.

Yes, slavery still goes on today, but not so much as in the past. Probably because nowadays machines can do many jobs, previously done by slaves, so it's less profitable/risky: machines can't mount a rebellion.

My guess as to why no one in the west cares is because it goes on overseas, where they don't see it.

It is obvious that the people demanding "master" and "slave" not be used are not offended by slavery per se, and are only interested in trying to score Twatter points by pointing out how ashamed of and offended they are by past white slavery.  Dummies.  Regrettable placeholders for humans, those people are.

As a white person, I'm offended by blacks enslaving whites in the past, just as much as the other way round.

[madires]

Another one: https://github.com/rust-lang/rust/pull/74127 (Rust)