The Free Software Foundation held a public election on how to do long options three decades or so ago. This was likely before the effects of Eternal September

The Free Software Foundation held a public election on how to do long options three decades or so ago. This was likely before the effects of Eternal September began destroying the public Usenet, so the vote may well have been held there, in one of the newsgroups relevant to the FSF, GCC or GNU. The '--' alternative won overwhelmingly, as I rememeber it. A few hundred votes were cast by email.