Master…

[Fab Foodie]

Most people that use the terms don’t know the origin and neither do they intend any offence. It remains the case that the connotation of white = good and black = undesirable does exist. Is is really too much to encourage their replacement with allowed and denied?

The ‘denied-Friday’ sale doesn’t have the same ring about it somehow….

 

[stowie]

Couldn't read the article, but I've grown up with m/s terminology for hard drives, floppy drives, usb devices and numerous other controllers - and it's only in the last year or so I've heard "primary/secondary" as an alternative. To my mind this is not an accurate description, but as long as the meaning is understood I have no problem with it.

Me too. The most common replacement I see is host / client or host / peripheral. The latter does have the advantage of being widely used to describe USB (although in that case the PC is easily seen as the host and the peripheral are actual PC peripherals). The "client" word has me thinking about web servers etc. It is quite illuminating how much the master / slave terminology sticks in my mind after decades of use, but like everything it will fade.

I do hope that these changes are not sticking plasters over the structural problems that the technology industry has had with race and gender. That will take a lot more to fix than word changes.

 

[Fab Foodie]

Thing is…light and dark, black and white, pure as snow are concepts as old as time. Should we abandon them?

 

[fozy tornip]

Common era
It removes the Christ bit from AD and BC. As it’s very odd that the whole world sets their calendar by the date of birth of Jesus.

The current Islamic year is 1443 AH.
For Buddhists it's 2563.
There are more.

 

[Fab Foodie]

The current Islamic year is 1443 AH.
For Buddhists it's 2563.
There are more.

For Rees-Mogg it’s 1857

 

[Archie_tect]

Yes. You should use principle bedroom or main bedroom

*cough* principal bedroom... just in the interests of completeness.

I annotate them on plans as Bedroom 1, 2, 3 etc. starting at the door to the first bedroom working clockwise from the head of the stair.

 

[FishFright]

Words and terms change with time , don't worry about it and move on.

 

[Deleted member 28]

Master/Slave clutch cylinder, best be careful 🤪

 

[Fab Foodie]

Words and terms change with time , don't worry about it and move on.

They do, it’s getting caught-out when usage changes that’s a concern.

 

[Bromptonaut]

I'm in the group that @shep would probably regard as Woke/PC and am accordingly careful with phraseology.

Not clear to me why the term master/slave in the context of computer drives or a car's hydraulic systems needs to change.

 

[Fab Foodie]

I'm in the group that @shep would probably regard as Woke/PC and am accordingly careful with phraseology.

Not clear to me why the term master/slave in the context of computer drives or a car's hydraulic systems needs to change.

No, me neither, I thought about that yesterday, except if the whole concept of 'Slave' is now deemed unsavoury. May be we should change 'Slave Cylinder' to 'Support (of it's own volition) Cylinder'....

 

[Deleted member 28]

No, me neither, I thought about that yesterday, except if the whole concept of 'Slave' is now deemed unsavoury. May be we should change 'Slave Cylinder' to 'Support (of it's own volition) Cylinder'....

Are you for real?

 

[AuroraSaab]

A lot of this is due to the US and the legacy of slavery. Terms like 'Master' come with much more baggage over there than they do in the UK and I can see why they might want to move away from their use. Language does evolve naturally, but if we are imposing changes, or even redefining words, that needs to be done with public concensus otherwise it becomes compelled speech.

 

[newfhouse]

Language does evolve naturally, but if we are imposing changes, or even redefining words, that needs to be done with public concensus otherwise it becomes compelled speech.

You're right that the legacy of slavery casts different shadows in the US.

There is no imposition or compulsion. In the case of the computing industry examples I gave, the IETF process is all about consensus.

 

[matticus]

A lot of this is due to the US and the legacy of slavery. Terms like 'Master' come with much more baggage over there than they do in the UK and I can see why they might want to move away from their use. Language does evolve naturally, but if we are imposing changes, or even redefining words, that needs to be done with public concensus otherwise it becomes compelled speech.

I'm respectful of baggage, truly, and I don't like causing offence to people where serious shoot* has affected them or their families/ancestors.
But I'm also against compelled speech, banning words, thought-crimes etc. So I like to see balance.

Can we not openly condemn slavery - including fighting very real 21st century slavery - and still discuss a flippin' computer server without invisible meanings being conjured up?

*didn't realise we still had the filters over here :P
("server" - should we be wary of that? It's quite like slave, or servant ... )