4 ms·

I suspect this is one of those topics that at some point, everyone will have just switched terms because it's not worth the hassle to fight these fights over an

I suspect this is one of those topics that at some point, everyone will have just switched terms because it's not worth the hassle to fight these fights over and over again. Kind of a "I'm not wrong, but is it a good use of 20 hours a year to argue about this?"

retox 6y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heckler%27s_veto https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heckler%27s_veto
- brianwawok 6y ago
  TIL thanks!
ajaimk 6y ago
Looks like that's the very point the author is trying to make. We can't give in to the dictatorship of the Small Minority specially when the most intolerant people seem to scream the loudest.
- crdrost 6y ago
  Oh HN, I weep for you. You trade compassionate impulses for paranoia about nonexistent dictatorships. You wish to have-your-cake-and-eat-it-too about topics like the power of words themselves — so that it’s “get off my back, my words do not have real power” but then this eats your very argument. If words DO have power, then you are legit hurting others: fix your shit. If words do not, then there is no point whining about the dangers of “dictators” telling you what words you can and can't use as it's all “who-gives-a-damn” anyway: and apparently these people before you give a damn, and if it is not too hard there is no excuse. This issue is not even a US-specific thing... I recall a Russian professor who got really hurt at some slides that showed metal links cracking around hands, “we are breaking the chains of existing physics methods,” as that has some really nasty power to make people uncomfortable if they are old enough to remember Stalin. I do not have a true solution, I am just sad. Because the true disease here is ego, is self-directed-ness, a cancer of me-me-me. Religions fix that, but good luck trying to promote that, heh. And the sort of people to be upset that “master-slave” makes reference to practices that have defined thousands of years of all nations’ history, are not likely to be ones to hear about the value of “emotionally intelligent leadership” or whatever the buzzword is now for not being a dick, and so that's not either. Truly depressing. As a minor historical footnote, it's not even accurate. Like the assumption is that slaves and masters are two different things, that having power and being property are two different states of being and it's impossible to be property while simultaneously having power. It's not just that those two concerns are obviously not opposites of each other... then you might say “well in practice...” But, like, it has also happened in history that slaves have occasionally ruled over nations[1]. They generally did well as rulers go, because a lot of history is really strong warlords coming to power and being extremely effective—perhaps even progressive and transformative—until they hand over the reins to their children who are not quite as talented as they were: and everything decays into a power and politics game, in all that nastiness. By choosing those without the right to a family to lead, that whole sordid business was avoided. 1. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Mamluk_sultans https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Mamluk_sultans
- capitol_ 6y ago
  It's a bit unclear if you are just trying to express the authors views or your own, but if those are your own views I felt that it warranted a reply. The concept of "dictatorship of small minority" implies that the only governing principle should be the vote of the majority. But that is a deeply flawed system, if there wasn't any other rule than "majority wins" then all oppression of minorities becomes valid and all abuse where the perpetrators outnumber the victims. For a system to be fair there must exist more rules than that, for example "respect bodily autonomy" and "no oppression of minorities" and so on. Many of those rules are more fundamental than the "majority wins" rule and more important to uphold. If those are not your own views: Sorry for the rant.
  - luckylion 6y ago
    > The concept of "dictatorship of small minority" implies that the only governing principle should be the vote of the majority. No, it does not. "I don't want to live under dictator A" does not imply "I want to enslave A" or "I want to live under dictator B", it only implies that I do not want to live under dictator A.
prepend 6y ago
I agree and keep a set of topics that just aren’t worth the mental anguish to discuss. The list started in the 90s where every single time circumcision was brought up, it devolved into a few people who commented more and more while the rest of the participants commented less. I’ve wondered how this affects actual opinions but can’t talk about it. I also wonder what other topics I haven’t noticed but others have checked out of and I’m missing their participation.
- microswan 6y ago
  This is the primary reason I no longer have accounts on "social media" (e.g., Facebook, Twitter, Reddit, etc.). It's not only exhausting. It's dangerous. It takes one minor misstep in the eyes of another and you're faced with a torrent of misconstrued, misinformed people pushing a narrative that you're a horrible person. Next, you've lost your job, business, or worse. And it's only getting worse now that the idea "silence is complicity" is becoming popular. Nope, no thanks. I'll see myself out. I know a lot of people dislike anonymity because trolls and bad actors abuse it. However, it also means voices like mine, who strive to operate in good faith, get lost.
  - prepend 6y ago
    For me, it just got boring. Every discussion was pre-ordained. Even simple “fun” stuff like Star Wars would devolve into the same pseudo argument, oppositionalist statements. It’s not anonymity as Facebook is real people, who I think enjoy not being anonymous with getting internet points from people who enjoy it. I think the issue is no social contract with me. They aren’t my friends so they don’t care so much about me. Private messenger groups with 20 people who know each other seems fine. Interestingly, completely anonymous IRC on freenode results in good discussions.
luckylion 6y ago
Which means that the perpetually offended will dictate name changes every other year. If somebody argues that they cannot use $software because it contains $word as a variable in its source code somewhere, it's certainly not a good idea to argue with them. It also not a good idea to appease them by doing what they ask. Maybe developers should steer clear of Twitter so they don't get exposed to the problem. The only winning move is not to play, much like with ads. You don't train yourself to ignore ads or to not be influenced by them, you just use an ad blocker.
- Pfhreak 6y ago
  Yeah? I don't see evidence that every two years a new word gets brigaded in source code. Do you have examples of projects this has been happening to? If not, this seems like a slippery slope fallacy.
  - luckylion 6y ago
    You're right, master/slave and the new blacklist/whitelist demands did not have two years between them, not even this post is two years old.
    - Pfhreak 6y ago
      Both of those have been discussions for much longer than two years. There's at least a decade of discussions around those two examples. Edit: closer to two decades - in 2003 LA asked electronics manufacturers not to use the language. Presumably this was first discussed by the community. In the mid aughts, Microsoft was using allowlist/deny list. So, hardly a recent phenomena, and certainly not every two years. Yes, some projects have been faster or slower to adopt replacements for these terms, which is why you have seen a few discussions in the past few weeks on HN.
tzs 6y ago
I'm kind of looking forward to when it gets far enough along that path for malicious compliance [1] to start kicking in. I think the Twitter blow up will be quite interesting the first time someone, say, in a discussion about the 19th century plantation economy in the southern US talks about white managers/black workers or white leaders/black followers to avoid the racist master/slave terminology. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malicious_compliance https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malicious_compliance
apta 6y ago
They should just ignore them. Leave the github issue open, just don't respond to it. Let's see where it gets those SJW's

retox 6y ago

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heckler%27s_veto https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heckler%27s_veto

brianwawok 6y ago
TIL thanks!

ajaimk 6y ago

Looks like that's the very point the author is trying to make. We can't give in to the dictatorship of the Small Minority specially when the most intolerant people seem to scream the loudest.

crdrost 6y ago
Oh HN, I weep for you. You trade compassionate impulses for paranoia about nonexistent dictatorships. You wish to have-your-cake-and-eat-it-too about topics like the power of words themselves — so that it’s “get off my back, my words do not have real power” but then this eats your very argument. If words DO have power, then you are legit hurting others: fix your shit. If words do not, then there is no point whining about the dangers of “dictators” telling you what words you can and can't use as it's all “who-gives-a-damn” anyway: and apparently these people before you give a damn, and if it is not too hard there is no excuse. This issue is not even a US-specific thing... I recall a Russian professor who got really hurt at some slides that showed metal links cracking around hands, “we are breaking the chains of existing physics methods,” as that has some really nasty power to make people uncomfortable if they are old enough to remember Stalin. I do not have a true solution, I am just sad. Because the true disease here is ego, is self-directed-ness, a cancer of me-me-me. Religions fix that, but good luck trying to promote that, heh. And the sort of people to be upset that “master-slave” makes reference to practices that have defined thousands of years of all nations’ history, are not likely to be ones to hear about the value of “emotionally intelligent leadership” or whatever the buzzword is now for not being a dick, and so that's not either. Truly depressing. As a minor historical footnote, it's not even accurate. Like the assumption is that slaves and masters are two different things, that having power and being property are two different states of being and it's impossible to be property while simultaneously having power. It's not just that those two concerns are obviously not opposites of each other... then you might say “well in practice...” But, like, it has also happened in history that slaves have occasionally ruled over nations[1]. They generally did well as rulers go, because a lot of history is really strong warlords coming to power and being extremely effective—perhaps even progressive and transformative—until they hand over the reins to their children who are not quite as talented as they were: and everything decays into a power and politics game, in all that nastiness. By choosing those without the right to a family to lead, that whole sordid business was avoided. 1. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Mamluk_sultans https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Mamluk_sultans
capitol_ 6y ago
It's a bit unclear if you are just trying to express the authors views or your own, but if those are your own views I felt that it warranted a reply. The concept of "dictatorship of small minority" implies that the only governing principle should be the vote of the majority. But that is a deeply flawed system, if there wasn't any other rule than "majority wins" then all oppression of minorities becomes valid and all abuse where the perpetrators outnumber the victims. For a system to be fair there must exist more rules than that, for example "respect bodily autonomy" and "no oppression of minorities" and so on. Many of those rules are more fundamental than the "majority wins" rule and more important to uphold. If those are not your own views: Sorry for the rant.
- luckylion 6y ago
  > The concept of "dictatorship of small minority" implies that the only governing principle should be the vote of the majority. No, it does not. "I don't want to live under dictator A" does not imply "I want to enslave A" or "I want to live under dictator B", it only implies that I do not want to live under dictator A.

prepend 6y ago

I agree and keep a set of topics that just aren’t worth the mental anguish to discuss. The list started in the 90s where every single time circumcision was brought up, it devolved into a few people who commented more and more while the rest of the participants commented less. I’ve wondered how this affects actual opinions but can’t talk about it. I also wonder what other topics I haven’t noticed but others have checked out of and I’m missing their participation.

microswan 6y ago
This is the primary reason I no longer have accounts on "social media" (e.g., Facebook, Twitter, Reddit, etc.). It's not only exhausting. It's dangerous. It takes one minor misstep in the eyes of another and you're faced with a torrent of misconstrued, misinformed people pushing a narrative that you're a horrible person. Next, you've lost your job, business, or worse. And it's only getting worse now that the idea "silence is complicity" is becoming popular. Nope, no thanks. I'll see myself out. I know a lot of people dislike anonymity because trolls and bad actors abuse it. However, it also means voices like mine, who strive to operate in good faith, get lost.
- prepend 6y ago
  For me, it just got boring. Every discussion was pre-ordained. Even simple “fun” stuff like Star Wars would devolve into the same pseudo argument, oppositionalist statements. It’s not anonymity as Facebook is real people, who I think enjoy not being anonymous with getting internet points from people who enjoy it. I think the issue is no social contract with me. They aren’t my friends so they don’t care so much about me. Private messenger groups with 20 people who know each other seems fine. Interestingly, completely anonymous IRC on freenode results in good discussions.

luckylion 6y ago

Which means that the perpetually offended will dictate name changes every other year. If somebody argues that they cannot use $software because it contains $word as a variable in its source code somewhere, it's certainly not a good idea to argue with them. It also not a good idea to appease them by doing what they ask. Maybe developers should steer clear of Twitter so they don't get exposed to the problem. The only winning move is not to play, much like with ads. You don't train yourself to ignore ads or to not be influenced by them, you just use an ad blocker.

Pfhreak 6y ago
Yeah? I don't see evidence that every two years a new word gets brigaded in source code. Do you have examples of projects this has been happening to? If not, this seems like a slippery slope fallacy.
- luckylion 6y ago
  You're right, master/slave and the new blacklist/whitelist demands did not have two years between them, not even this post is two years old.
  - Pfhreak 6y ago
    Both of those have been discussions for much longer than two years. There's at least a decade of discussions around those two examples. Edit: closer to two decades - in 2003 LA asked electronics manufacturers not to use the language. Presumably this was first discussed by the community. In the mid aughts, Microsoft was using allowlist/deny list. So, hardly a recent phenomena, and certainly not every two years. Yes, some projects have been faster or slower to adopt replacements for these terms, which is why you have seen a few discussions in the past few weeks on HN.

tzs 6y ago

I'm kind of looking forward to when it gets far enough along that path for malicious compliance [1] to start kicking in. I think the Twitter blow up will be quite interesting the first time someone, say, in a discussion about the 19th century plantation economy in the southern US talks about white managers/black workers or white leaders/black followers to avoid the racist master/slave terminology. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malicious_compliance https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malicious_compliance

apta 6y ago

They should just ignore them. Leave the github issue open, just don't respond to it. Let's see where it gets those SJW's