Yeah I should clarify this. So minor versions have always been able to remove packages (as per PEP 4) but, and perhaps this is just my perception more than real

Yeah I should clarify this. So minor versions have always been able to remove packages (as per PEP 4) but, and perhaps this is just my perception more than reality, it seems like the breaking changes of Python 3.x have decreased the psychological barrier for doing that and Python is now more willing to remove old packages (eg PEP 594). Like the genie is out of the bottle now. It's interesting reading some of the comments on PEP 594 that say "well most of these libraries are in pure Python so you can just include them if you want them" and I'm like "uhhhh... doesn't Python have enough problems with dependency management?" I compare all this to Java, which to me is really the gold standard for avoiding breaking changes (whatever other faults Java may have).