4 ms·

Are we so sensitive to racism that the word "master" is offensive? There is a task to change the default branch to "main". Note: there is no "slave" branch. I

Are we so sensitive to racism that the word "master" is offensive? There is a task to change the default branch to "main". Note: there is no "slave" branch. Intent matters, not the literal meaning of the word taken a specific orthogonal context. Not a single person in the millions of developers ever had a perverse notion of what master branch means.

fooey 6y ago
Are we so stubbornly "anti-sensitivity" that we have to have a fight over changing a word? The word is not necessary, so why does anyone have to be offended if it's changed?
- fermienrico 6y ago
  Not offended. The status quo = 'master'. You need to make a good reason to change it. The onus is on you to make a solid case to change the status quo. I am fine with it, it is just so far fetched that it seems unnecessary and pedantic. It would be hypocritical to target one thing but not the rest. How about also removing the word "Master" from the dictionary? We should go the full 9 yards you know. What's next? We wanna lobby MasterCard to rebrand themselves? Because everyone thinks that it is a card for the "Masters", right? Absolutely ridiculous. I also heard some noise about the Chess game and colors of the pieces.
  - bromuro 6y ago
    Take it easy - it is about time for a MasterCard rebranding :)
    - fermienrico 6y ago
      Lol, you never know. If even I agree with cancel culture, I intentionally want to push back on it because there is no nuance, there is no counter point being heard, there is absolutely no check and balance. It is just mob rule and that's dangerous to free thought and free speech. Immediately, after you read the previous sentence, I bet some of you had an image of me pop up in your mind - "Stupid Trump supporter, MAGA hat, gun loonie and a racist at heart". If it did, you are a danger to the society just like those people that I described. Soon, you'll have lawyers being cancelled because they're defending the racist criminal who have the right to an attorney. Whatever is going on today is extremely worrying.
  - Vinnl 6y ago
    > The status quo = 'master'. You need to make a good reason to change it. Why, though? As far as I'm concerned, Chesterton's Fence applies, i.e. you need to know the original reason, and then you're free to change it if you've got a better reason than that + the downsides of change itself. That bar seems to be met by this change.
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
- harisund 6y ago
  Oh please stop white knighting. The resources spent doing something unnecessary can be better spent elsewhere. No need to break scripts that have a hard coded master keyword in the. Nobody is offended it's being changed. Nobody is offended it says master either , it's just plain unnecessary and in general doing stupid and unnecessary things is a bad idea because it prevents the person doing so from doing something useful and good
Arnavion 6y ago
Without advocating for one side or the other, here are some links to catch you up to recent events: https://www.theregister.com/2020/06/08/developers_renew_push_to_get/ https://www.theregister.com/2020/06/08/developers_renew_push... https://sfconservancy.org/news/2020/jun/23/gitbranchname/ https://sfconservancy.org/news/2020/jun/23/gitbranchname/ https://github.blog/2020-07-27-highlights-from-git-2-28/#introducing-init-defaultbranch https://github.blog/2020-07-27-highlights-from-git-2-28/#int... and some previous discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23968417 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23968417
- fermienrico 6y ago
  I like how people are downvoting your comment for simply linking to resources. This way, we are in a mob rule. No one is independently thinking and questioning. Going against the grain is automatic suicide. Virtue signaling everywhere. Paul Graham writes about it: http://paulgraham.com/conformism.html http://paulgraham.com/conformism.html
dx034 6y ago
> Not a single person in the millions of developers ever had a perverse notion of what master branch means. Did you ask them all? I also never noted that it could be offensive. But "main" seems to be a good alternative and as long as master still works as a synonym, nothing should break changing it. The only contra to changing it would be the money Github spends on development. But that's their decision. Overall, I fail to see the problem.

fooey 6y ago

Are we so stubbornly "anti-sensitivity" that we have to have a fight over changing a word? The word is not necessary, so why does anyone have to be offended if it's changed?

fermienrico 6y ago
Not offended. The status quo = 'master'. You need to make a good reason to change it. The onus is on you to make a solid case to change the status quo. I am fine with it, it is just so far fetched that it seems unnecessary and pedantic. It would be hypocritical to target one thing but not the rest. How about also removing the word "Master" from the dictionary? We should go the full 9 yards you know. What's next? We wanna lobby MasterCard to rebrand themselves? Because everyone thinks that it is a card for the "Masters", right? Absolutely ridiculous. I also heard some noise about the Chess game and colors of the pieces.
- bromuro 6y ago
  Take it easy - it is about time for a MasterCard rebranding :)
  - fermienrico 6y ago
    Lol, you never know. If even I agree with cancel culture, I intentionally want to push back on it because there is no nuance, there is no counter point being heard, there is absolutely no check and balance. It is just mob rule and that's dangerous to free thought and free speech. Immediately, after you read the previous sentence, I bet some of you had an image of me pop up in your mind - "Stupid Trump supporter, MAGA hat, gun loonie and a racist at heart". If it did, you are a danger to the society just like those people that I described. Soon, you'll have lawyers being cancelled because they're defending the racist criminal who have the right to an attorney. Whatever is going on today is extremely worrying.
- Vinnl 6y ago
  > The status quo = 'master'. You need to make a good reason to change it. Why, though? As far as I'm concerned, Chesterton's Fence applies, i.e. you need to know the original reason, and then you're free to change it if you've got a better reason than that + the downsides of change itself. That bar seems to be met by this change.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
harisund 6y ago
Oh please stop white knighting. The resources spent doing something unnecessary can be better spent elsewhere. No need to break scripts that have a hard coded master keyword in the. Nobody is offended it's being changed. Nobody is offended it says master either , it's just plain unnecessary and in general doing stupid and unnecessary things is a bad idea because it prevents the person doing so from doing something useful and good

Arnavion 6y ago

Without advocating for one side or the other, here are some links to catch you up to recent events: https://www.theregister.com/2020/06/08/developers_renew_push_to_get/ https://www.theregister.com/2020/06/08/developers_renew_push... https://sfconservancy.org/news/2020/jun/23/gitbranchname/ https://sfconservancy.org/news/2020/jun/23/gitbranchname/ https://github.blog/2020-07-27-highlights-from-git-2-28/#introducing-init-defaultbranch https://github.blog/2020-07-27-highlights-from-git-2-28/#int... and some previous discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23968417 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23968417

fermienrico 6y ago
I like how people are downvoting your comment for simply linking to resources. This way, we are in a mob rule. No one is independently thinking and questioning. Going against the grain is automatic suicide. Virtue signaling everywhere. Paul Graham writes about it: http://paulgraham.com/conformism.html http://paulgraham.com/conformism.html

dx034 6y ago

> Not a single person in the millions of developers ever had a perverse notion of what master branch means. Did you ask them all? I also never noted that it could be offensive. But "main" seems to be a good alternative and as long as master still works as a synonym, nothing should break changing it. The only contra to changing it would be the money Github spends on development. But that's their decision. Overall, I fail to see the problem.