From Thomas Wouters, on behalf of and with full support of the Python Steering 
Council:

This discussion seems to have died down a little, but I still want to make a 
few things clear:

Yes, this is a political decision. Very many decisions are political. The 
existence of an open-source project is inherently political. The decision to 
try and make python-dev more welcoming, more open, more helpful is also a 
political decision -- one that the SC feels is absolutely necessary for the 
long-term health of the Python language. Not wanting to be bothered by 
political decisions is a political decision; it’s a decision that you’re happy 
with politics as they are. I’m afraid you can’t avoid politics.

This isn’t just about ‘master’ being rooted in slavery. This is about what the 
community sees and does. As I mentioned before, we’re not leading the pack in 
this, we’re merely following along with others (like, say, Django). There are 
undoubtedly other terms and practices that are genuinely offensive, and the 
decision on how to handle them will be taken on a case-by-case basis, weighing 
the cost and the benefit in each case.

While you may feel the benefit of this change is small and that it has no real 
impact, we believe that there is little cost to making this change. We believe 
this change, while a minor inconvenience to some, helps demonstrate our 
commitment to acting in the best interests of Python's future. Failure to make 
a small sacrifice, such as this, signals that the Python core development 
community would be unlikely to undertake real change for greater benefits.

This isn’t happening because GitHub/Microsoft made a political decision. It’s 
happening because it is incredibly easy to make this move, many projects have 
already done this, and it reflects badly on any project not making this change.

Speaking for the whole SC in this,
Thomas.

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