Twitter removing "master", "slave", and "blacklist" to be more inclusi

gailforecast

[Deleted User] wrote: »

We need change everything. Imagine losing a child and having to work in Twitter with people talking about killing children in the most efficient manner.

We should probably shut down all of our Apache servers also. Culture not Computers.

StupidLikeAFox

Deleted User wrote: »

We need change everything. Imagine losing a child and having to work in Twitter with people talking about killing children in the most efficient manner.

The subtle (but important) difference is that in your example you are just making up an issue where there isn't one

Stateofyou

Strumms wrote: »

In a previous life a job I had we used a particular piece of equipment called a ‘slave’... about 40% of those who used this equipment were of African heritage... they saw nothing wrong with using the term ‘slave’ in the referring context.

40% huh? You mathematically worked this out? And you polled all of them to get their personal opinions on the matter? And even if you were to have done that (which, lets be real, you didn't) they felt comfortable enough with you and in their workplace to speak up directly and honestly?

ronivek

StupidLikeAFox wrote: »

The subtle (but important) difference is that in your example you are just making up an issue where there isn't one

There's nothing stopping him from petitioning his company's leadership to make those changes in his own organisation either; and I guarantee nobody here would care. However because it's about making black people feel more welcome a bunch of angry critics tend to come out of the woodwork. Funny that.

gailforecast

StupidLikeAFox wrote: »

The subtle (but important) difference is that in your example you are just making up an issue where there isn't one

How is that not an issue, considering that master-slave is?

I work with a bunch of guys from India, and I dare say they couldn’t give a bollocks about having to work with master-slave architecture.

KiKi III

[Deleted User] wrote: »

The articles about this story say it will cost millions. I think when you're one of the most highly-paid employees in the country working for Twitter, you should just get on with it and not make your company spend millions because you mistakenly think master and slave refer solely to white and black people.

I highly doubt he believes slavery only exists in the form of white people owning black people. That’s a massive assumption you made based on nothing.

I’m sure he’s aware of modern slavery, child slavery, sex trafficking etc and finds it all abhorrent.

titan18

timmy_mallet wrote: »

Someone inside my own (US) org objected to an image/logo we had on an internal repo of three animated characters because it wasn't inclusive. We changed it. Cost about 3 minutes.

That person is sad

Alrigghtythen

[Deleted User] wrote: »

I just think it's completely and utterly retarded.

This is the correct answer

StupidLikeAFox

gailforecast wrote: »

How is that not an issue, considering that master-slave is?

I work with a bunch of guys from India, and I dare say they couldn’t give a bollocks about having to work with master-slave architecture.

You will have to ask Twitter that one, I wasn't at any of the meetings

Mr. Karate

Liberals and their White Savior complex.

Strumms

Stateofyou wrote: »

40% huh? You mathematically worked this out? And you polled all of them to get their personal opinions on the matter? And even if you were to have done that (which, lets be real, you didn't) they felt comfortable enough with you and in their workplace to speak up directly and honestly?

Yes, if there were 10 in the team, 4 were of African heritage... didn’t exactly need a calculator to come to that conclusion...

They felt comfortable enough to talk to me about all sorts of work issues and I knew their personalities to the degree that it was conclusive that it was not an issue.

StupidLikeAFox

I mean lets be honest here, this small change isn't going to save the world. People working at twitter will still need to type "why isn't the master replicating to the slave" if they want good answers from Stack Overflow. Its still a very weird weird thing for people external to the company to get a bee in their bonnet over

gailforecast

StupidLikeAFox wrote: »

You will have to ask Twitter that one, I wasn't at any of the meetings

Point being, you can find problems with a whole bunch of tech terms if you look hard enough.

hellsing101

StupidLikeAFox wrote: »

I mean lets be honest here, this small change isn't going to save the world. People working at twitter will still need to type "why isn't the master replicating to the slave" if they want good answers from Stack Overflow. Its still a very weird weird thing for people external to the company to get a bee in their bonnet over

It's a weird thing for Twitter to publicize and for publications to write about.
It's PR nonsense really and it has worked as we have people on here arguing over it (myself included).

Stateofyou

Strumms wrote: »

Yes, if there were 10 in the team, 4 were of African heritage... didn’t exactly need a calculator to come to that conclusion...

They felt comfortable enough to talk to me about all sorts of work issues and I knew their personalities to the degree that it was conclusive that it was not an issue.

All 40% those you assumed to have African heritage you're also going to massively assume you know them all personally well enough that their thoughts and feelings are totally transparent to you? That's ridiculous.

In reality, I'm sure most people of colour are quite aware of the negative blowback that would occur from actually giving their honest opinion about such things. Look at this thread, this is what often happens. They know that there's a good chance they're going to be called worthless cnuts or snowflakes or whatever and that voicing certain personal opinions could affect them professionally. You need to honestly look at your assumptions and biases here.

Strumms

Stateofyou wrote: »

All 40% those you assumed to have African heritage you're also going to massively assume you know them all personally well enough that their thoughts and feelings are totally transparent to you? That's ridiculous.

In reality, I'm sure most people of colour are quite aware of the negative blowback that would occur from actually giving their honest opinion about such things. Look at this thread, this is what often happens. They know that there's a good chance they're going to be called worthless cnuts or snowflakes or whatever and that voicing certain personal opinions could affect them professionally. You need to honestly look at your assumptions and biases here.

It’s ridiculous ? How ? I haven’t assumed anything ? As you get to know them, they talk about themselves, I talk about myself. In the workplace and socially too.

Thoughts and feelings are not transparent and neither are mine to them.. but in the workplace any thoughts, concerns or feelings that any of us have are valued deeply within the team, are discussed in an open, frank and constructive manner with understanding and empathy the backbone of our teamwork. You need to loose this terribly aggressive accusatory stance and be more open to reality.

I doubt it's just me that thinks this stuff is pathetic virtue signalling.

Nivea removing whitening from their whitening cream, which is used by people who have no interest in looking Caucasian.
Twitter removing master, slave and blacklist.
TV streaming services removing episodes of people wearing mud masks.

For all the issues black people scream about in America, so much of the response is superficial and stupid. It's all about good PR and fears of getting sued.

StupidLikeAFox

gailforecast wrote: »

Point being, you can find problems with a whole bunch of tech terms if you look hard enough.

I couldn't agree more. Except in this case Twitter didn't go looking - they were responding to an employee led initiative. Can you imagine a scenario where employees would raise concerns about something like this and Twitter would tell them to **** off and get over it?

Bannasidhe

MFPM wrote: »

When was this now?

1631 a Dutch convert to Islam based in Algeria was commander of a fleet of 3 ships that raided the English settler town of Baltimore in West Cork and captured around 30 people who were sold as slaves in Algiers.
The names of those taken doesn't include one Irish name.


English colonists in Ireland sold into slavery in Algeria by a Dutchman doesn't have the same call to outrage about it.

Stateofyou

Strumms wrote: »

It’s ridiculous ? How ? I haven’t assumed anything ? As you get to know them, they talk about themselves, I talk about myself. In the workplace and socially too.

Thoughts and feelings are not transparent and neither are mine to them.. but in the workplace any thoughts, concerns or feelings that any of us have are valued deeply within the team, are discussed in an open, frank and constructive manner with understanding and empathy the backbone of our teamwork. You need to loose this terribly aggressive accusatory stance and be more open to reality.

I already told you how and why it was ridiculous. No one can conclusively state that they know how work colleagues would feel about any particular issue, yet you claim to have that superpower. You said:
'I knew their personalities to the degree that it was conclusive that it was not an issue."

Again, if you think your Black colleagues in particular are going to feel comfortable discussing sensitive things like that openly in the workplace, then IN REALITY, you don't know them as well as you think you do. This thread is proof enough of that.

Your statements are assumptive and biased, and it's not an aggressive accusation to point it out just because you can't handle your own assumptions being pointed out. This isn't simon says. :pac:

ShareShare

Yeah my company is forcing us to do this too. Its so ridiculous. Master and slave are very legitimate terms for some operations and dynamics. Its a master list of data. Its a slave node/computer (it does jobs farmed out to it).

I could possibly understand blacklist turning to blocklist.

This silly changes cost so much money. What i dislike most about them is the US identity politics governing how the rest of us use language that isn't related to their own going struggles.

Companies arent changing due to belief. It's changing due to the reputational risk should the identity politics bring its ever seeing eye to them. It only takes one stupid blogger to do it. When someone asks why you should refuse to change your language to accommodate someone if you dont really care either way.. this is the type of nonsense people fear. The ridiculous extremes it leaks into if not challenged.

Its a sad year for politics when i find the right in US more accepting and more reasonable that this extreme left nonsense.

Jurgen Klopp

KungPao wrote: »

I just heard the BBC and BMW are changing their names.

When will the madness end?

You actually got me there cause it's just like something the BBC would do

Strumms

Stateofyou wrote: »

I already told you how and why it was ridiculous. No one can conclusively state that they know how work colleagues would feel about any particular issue, yet you claim to have that superpower. You said:
'I knew their personalities to the degree that it was conclusive that it was not an issue."

Again, if you think your Black colleagues in particular are going to feel comfortable discussing sensitive things like that openly in the workplace, then IN REALITY, you don't know them as well as you think you do. This thread is proof enough of that.

Your statements are assumptive and biased, and it's not an aggressive accusation to point it out just because you can't handle your own assumptions being pointed out. This isn't simon says. :pac:

Yes, we spoke about all sorts of issues at our workplace, in the bar after and beyond. Professionally , seriously and indeed humorously. I know the guys, what they are comfortable with what they'd speak strongly and passionately about in meetings and and indeed socially. You don’t know any of them, you’ve no proof of anything but signal away

Stateofyou

Strumms wrote: »

Yes, we spoke about all sorts of issues at our workplace, in the bar after and beyond. Professionally , seriously and indeed humorously. I know the guys, what they are comfortable with what they'd speak strongly and passionately about in meetings and and indeed socially. You don’t know any of them, you’ve no proof of anything but signal away

I actually can't believe the level of self-important assumption here. Yeah I have really close work mates I consider friends, and our families have mixed, etc etc. I still would never presume to state that I know what they think on any given matter "conclusively." That's bs and you know it. You have no conclusive proof, actually. You're signaling something alright!

s7ryf3925pivug

It's not going to cost millions to rename a few objects.
It is a silly gimmick though.

Strumms

Stateofyou wrote: »

I actually can't believe the level of self-important assumption here. Yeah I have really close work mates I consider friends, and our families have mixed, etc etc. I still would never presume to state that I know what they think on any given matter "conclusively." That's bs and you know it. You have no conclusive proof, actually. You're signaling something alright!

The only proof, is what they themselves tell me, and have done over time. Not presuming anything, being told, pure and simple

Graham Scrawny Sequence

Graham Scrawny Sequence wrote: »

It's not going to cost millions to rename a few objects.
It is a silly gimmick though.

It depends. Twitter is build on Scala, which is built on Java. If they intend to remove all references to those words, it's a huge job. You can't just refactor what your entire application is built on top of and throw it into production.

I'd love to know more detail on what is needed and how they will do it. I just did a search of my server which has a Scala application running on it and the word slave came up all over the place.

ShareShare

Graham Scrawny Sequence wrote: »

It's not going to cost millions to rename a few objects.
It is a silly gimmick though.

Wouldnt it? You've got to change the code base, the tests, the deployment scripts, the auto scaling farms, the UI's. Test all that and everything else with a deployment cycle. Maybe even clients of some libraries will be forced to update values passed in?
That is going to get done in all the medium sized companies etc. This could indeed cost millions. Of course, its spread across alot of companies/countries/domains so the cost will never be calculated really.

The blacklist to blocklist i could easily get behind. It's all subjective of course. I just wish nuance of usage was allowed in this current ideological pushes. It's so black and white (no pun, seriously)

This is a simple question I found on StackOverflow about Java.. Imagine trying to rewrite all of Java to get rid of Master and Slave. Running your own fork of it because it offends an employee and having to redo it every time Java is updated or you add something.

I can run SparkPi example on the master node, but when I try the same command "spark-submit --class SparkPi --master yarn-client sparkpi.jar 10" on the slave node, I got an error

Bob the Builder

As a developer myself, this is the most ridiculous thing I've ever seen. There's a huuuuuuge amount of work required in this and for almost zilch reward.

Diversity comes from hiring a diverse set of people for your team - in fact, our team has something like 28 different nationalities among 75 people. That's real diversity, not this git branch naming nonsense.

It's not even master/slave - it's more like master/develop or master/feature. And in other scenarios, master/slave describes perfectly what's happening - and there's no alternative naming - leader/follower, teacher/pupil, parent/child? None of these accurately describe to the same accuracy, what a master/slave relationship is.

Anyone who works in a tech company and is in a position to make these calls should know better.