On Mon, Jun 15, 2020 at 13:09 bch <[email protected]> wrote: > > > On Mon, Jun 15, 2020 at 12:18 Greg A. Woods <[email protected]> wrote: > >> At Mon, 15 Jun 2020 20:35:46 +0200, Kamil Rytarowski <[email protected]> >> wrote: >> Subject: Re: blacklist -> blocklist in current >> > >> > Whitelist/blacklist is a regular term in computing. I have never seen >> > 'blocklisting' before. >> >> Popularity != fairness; and so on.... >> >> This article from 2018 might help point out the inherent issues with the >> choice of certain terms: >> >> https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6148600/ >> > > From the cited article: > > > does not merely reflect a racist culture, but also serves to legitimize > and perpetuate it. > > I looked up the origins and usages of “blacklist” the other day and see > references to Kings listing their enemies on a “black list”[0][1], etc, but > no indication of racism (nb: “black ball” or “blackball” (surprisingly to > me, predate blacklist) do also seem to contraindicate racist undertones, > but interestingly bring us the word “ostracize”, descended from the Greek > pottery device used to cast votes - but I digress[2]). > > I’m 100% for eliminating master/slave (for leader/follower), as an example > of politically charged verbiage, but I’m not convinced “blacklist” falls > into the same category at all. I think the intent is in the right place, > but just misapplied. >
I hasten to add: it’s not even clear to me racism was at all a motivating factor - given that, I speak out of turn regarding intention and proper application. Apologies to @christos for that. > Interested to hear differently. > > -bch > > [0] > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blacklisting > > [1] > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blackballing > > [2] > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ostracism > > > >> On the other hand there are deliberate biases in choice of certain terms >> since they are indeed intended to indicate positive and negative >> opposites, however the more "neutral" one can be in choosing such terms, >> then the longer those terms might hope to hold out as inoffensive to as >> many people as possible. >> >> Personally I prefer "allow"/"deny", but I'm not sure what lists of >> things that are "allowed" or "denied" should more generically be called. >> We do have one example of such lists already supported in NetBSD: >> /etc/hosts.allow and /etc/hosts.deny >> >> -- >> Greg A. Woods <[email protected]> >> >> Kelowna, BC +1 250 762-7675 RoboHack <[email protected]> >> Planix, Inc. <[email protected]> Avoncote Farms <[email protected]> >> >
