IBM, Red Hat, VMware & Others Form The Inclusive Naming Initiative

[skeevy420]

Wrong. His argument is "the way they try to reduce racism is actually amplifying it". If I understand him well.

It's closer to "they're trying to reduce racism by excluding terms and creating cultural divisions" It isn't racism as much as it is culture-ism, moralism, or idealism. It doesn't target race as much as it targets thought and ideas. IMHO, by putting so much emphasis on master they're making it worse than it actually is.

By trying to fight racism they're giving the words they're against more power by making them taboo and dividing us. That directly describes what is going on in this thread and what all this inclusiveness stuff has actually done. We're more divided now than we were before all the master/main colorlist pander to everyone fascists started getting their way. At least that's how I see all of this.

I just see promoting education and learning why things may or may not be racist as a better solution than throwing down a banhammer. And when it comes from a committee or group people tend to jump on the bandwagon, especially with groups like this because they have the moral highground from the start; the we're doing it for the children angle. Nazis didn't start out as genocidal butchers. They actually had good intentions or used the guise of good intentions. Varies by historian. MAGGA. Make All Germans Great Again. It went to shit from there.

I fear how far things like this will go, what people will say or do to be accepted by that group, what long term influences ideals like that will have on society, and the hate and evil that they'll all justify as the greater good if it comes to that point.

[cyclistefou]

The argument you're making is "because we can't be perfect now we shouldn't do anything now". The simple fact is that had these terminologies been invented by people of color we would absolutely never have had a 'master/slave' terminology in computing.
[...]

Completely ridiculous claim. Man, if there is some SW or HW entity in computing that controls others, the others are obeying the former and can take no initiative, then this fits perfectly the definition of masters and slaves. Period. Colored or white people could name it master/slave identically because this is not an endorsement of human slavery. And even in the context of human slavery, it is perfectly fine to use the terms "master"/"slave" to refer to the various roles. This is not endorsing slavery (which of course is despicable but why do I even bother saying that), but this is just giving names. How do you refer to something, good or evil or neutral, without giving it a NAME?

How is it offensive to call a master... a master, and a slave... a slave? The human slavery as historical (and still current) fact, is horrible, but it is not the mentioning of it that is! It can also be mentioned for denouncing it!

Forbidding names like master / slave is completely moronic.

[pixo]

This seems like a great initiative. The barrier to entry into tech is already very high for large swaths of the population, as indicated by literally every comment I've read here up to this point.

Anything we can do to make it easier for people to join and flourish the tech communities helps. This by itself is of course not close to enough but making these sorts of changes sends an important signal.

No, this makes the barrier higher. Humanity has many cultures but this forces to you to learn a new one vetted by the CORRECT people.
You cant use terms that are ok in your culture just because the CORRECT people say so. And it is mostly base on the young US culture.
It is insulting for people of all other cultures and does exactly opposite of what you state.

Many of the terms used are understood by many cultures.
Take master/slave. The relationship is understood by most, if not all, adult humans. It has nothing to do with racism outside of US. Humans have enslaved other regardless of skin color and difference. Yet only the US one matters.

The argument you're making is "because we can't be perfect now we shouldn't do anything now". The simple fact is that had these terminologies been invented by people of color we would absolutely never have had a 'master/slave' terminology in computing. Does that mean the people who invented those terms were necessarily bad people? no. But it also doesn't mean we have to just accept those terms forever. It costs very little, except for these kinds of weird arguments online, and it can potentially help make the tech industry easier to navigate for a large groups of people.

What if it doesn't actually help? Then we will try different things. Society evolves. It's fine.

What does "people of color" mean? Is white not a color? Isnt this term used by racist saying that only white people are the bad ones?
I have a news for you, slavers were also from "people of color". Not to mention you are trying to speak for milliards of living and dead people.
You can find assholes of any color. Same for people using well understood terms to describe relations to things that has nothing to do with the original ones.
Software or hardware cannot be a slave in the original meaning of the word as it has no free will you can take from it.

Also nice of you calling everyone from different society and culture a barbarian.
Wait, I am not Greek nor I have Roman citizenship so I am a barbarian.

[andyprough]

ROFL. That's just plain funny right there.

Whitesource Bolt. I can't think of ANY negative connection whatsoever

Also, from their Careers page:


I think eggshell white is the color of the darkest person in that picture. And look at all the redheads. Clearly a lot of them are of Nordic descent. Obviously that's racist company

Those are Israeli's.

[cyclistefou]

That's a super trite, and frankly boring, example. The argument is 'because there are bigger problems as well we can't look at the smaller problems'.[...]

And what about "there are bigger problems as well we can't look at the completely made-up, puffy, invented problems."

I will concede to you that I am ok to change from "blacklist/whitelist", to something different, not because I think it's important, but ok why not. But on others like "master"/"slave", no way, that's just beyond ridiculous, idiotic, and is insulting my intelligence. Sorry, I won't be a dumb sheep, and I won't follow this trainwreck of idiotic SJW bigotry.

[Mez']

How is it offensive to call a master... a master, and a slave... a slave? The human slavery as historical (and still current) fact, is horrible, but it is not the mentioning of it that is! It can also be mentioned for denouncing it!

As Magritte would say:



"This is not a pipe."

[f0rmat]

Completely ridiculous claim. Man, if there is some SW or HW entity in computing that controls others, the others are obeying the former and can take no initiative, then this fits perfectly the definition of masters and slaves. Period. Colored or white people could name it master/slave identically because this is not an endorsement of human slavery. And even in the context of human slavery, it is perfectly fine to use the terms "master"/"slave" to refer to the various roles. This is not endorsing slavery (which of course is despicable but why do I even bother saying that), but this is just giving names. How do you refer to something, good or evil or neutral, without giving it a NAME?

How is it offensive to call a master... a master, and a slave... a slave? The human slavery as historical (and still current) fact, is horrible, but it is not the mentioning of it that is! It can also be mentioned for denouncing it!

Forbidding names like master / slave is completely moronic.

I agree. Slavery does exist today. It is called "trafficking in persons" and is far more widespread than most people know. And here is a dirty little secret - it occurs in Asia, Africa, Eastern Europe, Central America, and South America on a fairly large scale. Western Europe and North America not so much (although it is seen along the US southern border and the west coast). You can do the research - but I will give you a hint, there are many females (and males) working in the sex trade that are not doing it by choice. Antarctica does not seem to have it (I wonder why ) and I know not about Australia.

But I do not see anyone clamoring to get rid of the word "traffic" (the base of trafficking). If we did, would we get rid of "traffic jam" and then get rid of "jam" because it implies "traffic jam?" Instead of being influenced by US politics to get rid of words that describe a situation that ended in the US decades ago, why do we not do something to get rid of a situation that we definitely have now.

[TMM_]

It's closer to "they're trying to reduce racism by excluding terms and creating cultural divisions"

No, what's happening is the removal of a cultural division between people of good faith. This new cultural division is between people who oppose trying to be more inclusive and those who do not. You can make a 'paradox of tolerance' argument until you see blue in the face but it is very simple: most of the world is moving on from these things. If that makes you feel excluded then tough shit. If NOT using a term that hurts others hurts you I'm afraid that's your problem.

[skeevy420]

Those are Israeli's.

Did not know that. I was just having a little fun with an initial perspective on something.

But thanks for pointing that out.

It goes back to the perspective point I was trying to make earlier. Depending on where one lives, Whitesource Bolt can be racist, have negative connections, or have no special meanings whatsoever...just like how me using an image and giving a knee-jerk, jump to conclusion perspective means naught when the facts are presented. Education over banning.

[f0rmat]

Did not know that. I was just having a little fun with an initial perspective on something.

But thanks for pointing that out.

It goes back to the perspective point I was trying to make earlier. Depending on where one lives, Whitesource Bolt can be racist, have negative connections, or have no special meanings whatsoever...just like how me using an image and giving a knee-jerk, jump to conclusion perspective means naught when the facts are presented. Education over banning.

And THAT is a learning point for everyone.