4 ms·
Historically, white/blacklist did not have racial origins, but history is always happening. The original intent of a word can be erased by its proximity to new
by eat_veggies 6y ago
Historically, white/blacklist did not have racial origins, but history is always happening. The original intent of a word can be erased by its proximity to new taboos and new circumstances, and in this case, white/black have been racialized.
See also: the disappearance of the words "niggardly" and "feck" from common English usage, or how Thais are uneasy using the word "fuk" (gourd, pumpkin) [0]
[0] https://sci-hub.tw/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780198808190.013.10 https://sci-hub.tw/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780198808190.013.10
- throwanem 6y agoIn our own industry, too, "master/slave" being gradually replaced by "primary/replica", "primary/secondary", etc. There was a lot of similar red-top-style complaining about "political correctness gone mad!" in the early days of that change, too. Now the new terms are totally unremarkable, and it's a real surprise to encounter the old. As you say, history is always happening. My days of talking about "whitelists" and "blacklists", modulo the occasional slip as I start modifying my lexical habit, are done.
- PaulDavisThe1st 6y agoThanks for the reminder of this. In the last release of my software, we renamed all the "slave" objects to be "masters", without any real thought to the connected social implications.