
On Redis master-slave terminology (2018) - markdog12
http://antirez.com/news/122
======
IceDane
Note that this is from 2018.

I personally totally agree with the author. Anyone who chooses to be offended
by words used in a totally different context is doing exactly that - choosing
to be offended.

If we keep going down this path of endless meaningless virtue signalling,
where will we stop? Is the term "black hole" racist too? What about blackout?
Etc, etc.

No one really cares about these terms and it they do their opinion shouldn't
outweigh the time, effort required to fix it, or the opinions of everyone
else.

Supporting this kind of asinine shit is essentially letting big corps like
Google get away with doing practically nothing while seeming like the good
guys. Stop focusing on the surface level shit and start focusing on the real
issues.

~~~
tzs
> Is the term "black hole" racist too?

That has been objected to [1][2][3]. A white county commissioner described a
slow office as a black hole for paperwork, a black county commissioner said
that was racist and it should be called a white hole, and a black judge asked
the first commissioner to apologize for his racist remark. Also, "angel food
cake" and "devil's food cake" were also declared racist, apparently, in the
same incident [3].

[1] [https://www.discovermagazine.com/the-sciences/sometimes-a-
bl...](https://www.discovermagazine.com/the-sciences/sometimes-a-black-hole-
is-just-a-black-hole)

[2]
[https://www.csmonitor.com/Commentary/Opinion/2008/0723/p09s0...](https://www.csmonitor.com/Commentary/Opinion/2008/0723/p09s01-coop.html)

[3]
[https://www.npr.org/sections/newsandviews/2008/07/is_black_h...](https://www.npr.org/sections/newsandviews/2008/07/is_black_hole_a_racist_term.html)

~~~
blackhole999
Perhaps not racist but the origin is quite horrifying

 _According to Hong-Yee Chiu, an astrophysicist at NASA, the Black Hole of
Calcutta was the inspiration for the term black hole referring to regions of
space-time resulting from the gravitational collapse of very heavy stars. He
recalled hearing physicist Robert Dicke in the early 1960s compare such
gravitationally collapsed objects to the prison_

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Hole_of_Calcutta](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Hole_of_Calcutta)

~~~
judge2020
Despite the origin, I would guess most people associate the name to the fact
that black holes suck up all light (with the color black being the absence of
light), as well as how pictures of black holes show the color as black.

------
mk1982
In the meantime, the Slave terminology is on its way out in Redis too.

Here are a few commits:
[https://github.com/antirez/redis/search?q=%22slave+removal%2...](https://github.com/antirez/redis/search?q=%22slave+removal%22&type=Commits)

Here's the issue where some of the discussion happened:
[https://github.com/antirez/redis/issues/5335](https://github.com/antirez/redis/issues/5335)

~~~
hartator
It's paradoxical that they want these changes merged to "master".

~~~
ATsch
Master has multiple meanings, not just slave master. As in mastery, master
tape, master craftsman. In git, there are no "slave" branches, so "master"
does not evoke slavery.

~~~
anentropic
On the contrary, naming of "master" branch in git does seem to derive from
master/slave terminology... [https://mail.gnome.org/archives/desktop-devel-
list/2019-May/...](https://mail.gnome.org/archives/desktop-devel-
list/2019-May/msg00066.html)

~~~
bonzini
That's hearsay. Bitkeeper uses master/slave for repositories not branches.

------
brianwawok
I suspect this is one of those topics that at some point, everyone will have
just switched terms because it's not worth the hassle to fight these fights
over and over again. Kind of a "I'm not wrong, but is it a good use of 20
hours a year to argue about this?"

~~~
ajaimk
Looks like that's the very point the author is trying to make. We can't give
in to the dictatorship of the Small Minority specially when the most
intolerant people seem to scream the loudest.

~~~
capitol_
It's a bit unclear if you are just trying to express the authors views or your
own, but if those are your own views I felt that it warranted a reply.

The concept of "dictatorship of small minority" implies that the only
governing principle should be the vote of the majority. But that is a deeply
flawed system, if there wasn't any other rule than "majority wins" then all
oppression of minorities becomes valid and all abuse where the perpetrators
outnumber the victims.

For a system to be fair there must exist more rules than that, for example
"respect bodily autonomy" and "no oppression of minorities" and so on. Many of
those rules are more fundamental than the "majority wins" rule and more
important to uphold.

If those are not your own views: Sorry for the rant.

~~~
luckylion
> The concept of "dictatorship of small minority" implies that the only
> governing principle should be the vote of the majority.

No, it does not. "I don't want to live under dictator A" does not imply "I
want to enslave A" or "I want to live under dictator B", it _only_ implies
that I do not want to live under dictator A.

------
x3haloed
The project maintainer absolutely has the right to choose not to remove
offensive language. Although, I find his position to be unnecessarily
defensive. What is he really fighting for? The language is outdated and stems
from a practice that is universally shunned. There is work involved in
changing the language yet there is no harm in it. People absolutely have the
right to be offended. Feeling offended is just that - a feeling. If we don’t
have a right to experience feelings, then what do we have a right to? And the
right to express our feelings with our speech and writing is known as “freedom
of speech”, which is not a universal right in the world, but it’s a popular
one. While it’s impossible to prevent offending everyone all the time, again,
it’s outdated language referring to a shunned practice. This is more than a
handful of individuals expressing offended feelings based on esoteric personal
perspectives. Changing the language would be more welcoming towards people who
still deal with the fallout of such a shunned practice. Again, doing so is not
a requirement of any kind, and I’m not claiming racism. I’m just claiming a
failure to understand, respect, and welcome people who live in a world still
mired in the effects of a devastating practice. I would change the language.

~~~
eterps
> The project maintainer absolutely has the right to choose not to remove
> offensive language.

What offensive language has been communicated in this case?

> What is he really fighting for?

Wasn't that clearly explained in the post?

> The language is outdated and stems from a practice

Outdated? Has the 'practice' you're referring to dissappeared?

> from a practice that is universally shunned.

What to think of people practicing BDSM? Or bioligists describing insect
behaviour? Is their language offensive?

> There is work involved in changing the language yet there is no harm in it.

It is harmful when it deflects from the actual problems we have in our society
these days. Just because something is immediately actionable doesn't mean it
is effective or even helpful.

> People absolutely have the right to be offended.

Of course people may feel offended, they just shouldn't automatically get
additional rights by being offended.

> Changing the language would be more welcoming towards people

I agree with that. But I'm dissapointed that people are content with it. IMO
it distracts from more pressing issues that need to be addressed.

~~~
x3haloed
Nice attempt at deconstrivism.

I will address a few of your points together:

> What offensive language has been communicated in this case? > Outdated? Has
> the 'practice' you're referring to dissappeared? > What to think of people
> practicing BDSM? Or bioligists describing insect behaviour? Is their
> language offensive?

I’m referring, obviously, to the language of “slave and master.” The practice
of slavery, unfortunately, has not disappeared, but is universally banned and
recognized as morally wrong. The use of language based on slavery in computer
science was dreampt up long ago, and it’s time to rethink it - just as
“mongoloid” used to be the official scientific word to refer to people with
mental disabilities. I highly doubt you or the author would defend so
vigorously the right to keep using that term in software APIs and
documentation. It was a silly idea to use the word in the first place, and
there’s simply no good reason to use it now. As for BDSM and language about
insect behavior, that’s completely within a different realm, because those
topics are not related to the long history of systemic suppression and
subjection of an entire class of people

You and other proponents of leaving offensive language intact are blinded by
binary thinking - the slippery slope argument. That if one thing is done to
address offended people, then something must be done for everyone who is
offended, and where does it end? Therefore the slippery slope. That misguided
type of thinking supposes that all moral decisions can be made on a set of
universally applied rules that will decide what is right and what must be done
about it. But the world is gray - not black and white, and no two situations
are the same. Judgement is necessary in every situation.

>> What is he really fighting for? > Wasn't that clearly explained in the
post? Not really. What was clear from the post was that he didn’t want to do
it, and he felt he wasn’t wrong for not doing it. That doesn’t explain why he
went through the effort of presumably spending hours to write a lengthy blog
post about it. The question then, is why is he fighting so hard against making
some code and documentation changes?

And on a related note:

>> Changing the language would be more welcoming towards people > I agree with
that. But I'm dissapointed that people are content with it. IMO it distracts
from more pressing issues that need to be addressed. I think that actively
fighting against changing the language by spending inordinate amounts of time
writing blogs about his refusal to change the language is a huge distraction.
Just do it or don’t do it.

>> There is work involved in changing the language yet there is no harm in it.
> It is harmful when it deflects from the actual problems we have in our
society these days. Just because something is immediately actionable doesn't
mean it is effective or even helpful. And who has determined that is not an
actual problem? Or that this is not effective or helpful? You? The white males
who run the world?

>> People absolutely have the right to be offended. Of course people may feel
offended, they just shouldn't automatically get additional rights by being
offended. To which additional rights are you referring?

~~~
eterps
Thanks for your reply, I'll have to give it more thought. I agree with most of
it though.

> You and other proponents of leaving offensive language intact

I was/am actually in favor of removing said language because I want language
to be welcoming towards people and people are clearly taking offense.

> And who has determined that is not an actual problem? Or that this is not
> effective or helpful? You?

No, I am in no way able to determine that. And I really hope it is helpful.

~~~
x3haloed
After writing my post, I thought again about directing my arguments at you
specifically. It was maybe too personal and assumptive. I think I got too
defensive.

Anyway, I appreciate that you read what I wrote and chose to keep in the
conversation.

~~~
eterps
Thank you. After reading my initial comment and having given it some thought I
think I need to reconsider some of my points.

I really like how ljm put it in this comment:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23509854](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23509854)

------
joshuakelly
@dang please add a year flag to this - it's especially important given that
Redis and antirez moved in a direction opposite of what this blog post
describes (see other comments in the thread)

------
dewey
I've read about a bunch of these renaming efforts in the past weeks and I
think some of these are very justified while some of them seem to take it
further than necessary.

The master/slave naming seems clearly outdated to me and this one is a direct
reference to slavery. A better word like replica exists so I'm using that
instead. This makes a lot of sense.

On the other hand there's efforts to rename white/black list or the "master"
branch on git. I've never thought of these as even being related to racism
until people started opening issues on Github projects about that. A master
branch in this context is just like a vinyl master, or a master class to me.
The final finished product and not any kind of reference to slavery. Am I
wrong?

~~~
fstephany
I always thought about it as the "vinyl master" analogy as well but it looks
like it has a master/slave origin from the Bitkeeper days.

[https://mail.gnome.org/archives/desktop-devel-
list/2019-May/...](https://mail.gnome.org/archives/desktop-devel-
list/2019-May/msg00066.html)

~~~
dgellow
Honestly, why does it matter where the word comes from? Virtually no one ever
used a git master branch thinking about slavery and not the "vinyl master"
analogy. Shouldn't that be the actual meaning that is worth evaluating?
Language evolves over time, the "master" in the git context doesn't have any
reference anymore (in meaning) to the master/slave (which is a stupid wording
to be honest) from bitkeeper. A soft proof to that is that every time that
discussion occurs, you have lot of comments expressing their confusion given
that the word in git context is actually used as a "master record".

------
oddevan
The problem I’m starting to see is that the continued use of phrases like this
(master/slave, blacklist/whitelist) can be a constant reminder to some that
they “don’t belong here.” Obviously, in this context, they aren’t meant to be
racist; but they are a reminder that racism exists. The end result is that it
makes more people feel unwanted and ultimately leave tech.

~~~
YeGoblynQueenne
Yikes. "Blacklist" has nothing to do with skin colour. In a different context,
"being in the black" is a positive situation and contrasted with "being in the
red".

We start down that path and we'll end up banning "Paint it black" as a racist
song.

~~~
loeg
A blacklist may not have anything to do with skin color, but being on a
blacklist usually has _negative_ connotations, not positive.

The related term is "whitelist," not "redlist." So I can understand why people
might believe the pair has racial overtones.

~~~
YeGoblynQueenne
I think this is a similar misunderstanding as attributing the spelling
"history" (which is a typical transliteration of the word "ιστορία" from
Greek, that doesn't have a "his" syllable) to the fact that history is
dominated by male figures. Some have suggested the term should be changed to
"herstory" to recognise the contribution of women to history.

To my mind, thinking that "blacklisting" has racist connotations because we
all African people "black" also, is a similar kind of confusion.

Edit: to clarify what I'm trying to say. The fact that "black" is in
"blacklist" is a coincidence and nothing to do with racism. Same as the fact
that "his" is in "history".

~~~
gruez
>Some have suggested the term should be changed to "herstory" to recognise the
contribution of women to history.

Which is funny in itself. "history" is sexist because it's male, so let's do
some affirmative action and make it sexist in the other direction!

------
zozbot234
Here we go again. But seriously, what's wrong with using "primary" and
"replica" in a database context? They're generally clearer terms anyway.
Obviously we'll be stuck talking about "master" and "slave" IDE connectors and
the like, but other than that it seems to be falling out of use pretty much
everywhere.

~~~
messe
Also on the topic of Whitelist/Blacklist, I thought it was stupid to go about
renaming, but then I saw the alternative was Allowlist/Blocklist, which IMO is
much clearer (doubly so for non-native speakers).

------
ljm
I have to be honest, I think this kind of conversation is a difficult one to
have because it can be far too easy to start arguing against what you _think_
the other person is saying, not what they actually _are_ saying. There's a lot
of nuance that isn't done justice to (perhaps ironically so), especially as
these conversations kick off from github issues, or on social media, and
almost instantly devolve from there.

I often find myself getting a headache while reading some of these
'conversations' as I try to get my head around the various perspectives at
play. Some of it is truly exhausting, particularly the 'what about the
slippery slope' argument that often comes up (in this comment section we have
'what about black hole', 'what about blackout'; in others it's 'what about
maestro', etc.). Similarly, it's tiring to repeatedly hear the defence of
censoring or erasing history. At the same time, the same is true of those in a
hurry to brand others as racists, fascists, or otherwise phobic of something.
These all feel like blunt instruments that do more to shut down the
conversation rather than encourage it.

There are way more than two sides to this story, it really isn't as black and
white as the conversation can make it out to be (on so many levels). And as
far as I'm concerned it's a conversation that requires one to take a step back
for several moments and seriously consider the things that are currently at
stake, and to start healthily unpacking this before jumping to an instinctual
response.

For me, the way we discuss this is just as much about compassion and genuine
empathy, and adapting to change, as it is anything else. And also for me, if
the terms 'master' and 'slave' have served their purpose and need to be
changed, so be it. That doesn't upset me at all, but the toxic and hateful
drama that often spews from such a decision really does.

------
qbaqbaqba
Why do majority of people here hearing slave thinks about black people?
"Slave" comes from Latin where it initially meant a Slavic person. Northern
African slave traders, Turkish jasyr slaves, slavery of eastern European women
(Slavic and Jewish) sold to brothels in South America are also all but
forgotten. Racism is disgusting in any form but limiting slavery to only
America is also racist.

------
rrss
(I have no opposition to replacing master-slave, this is not intended as bait
- I'm curious what others think).

How about "robot?" From "Broken Metaphor: The Master-Slave Analogy in
Technical Literature" [1]:

> a new term meaning "slave" was entering the English language to describe an
> autonomous device meant to obey its master: "robot," from the 1923
> translation of Karel Cˇapek's 1921 play R.U.R. (the word robot having been
> derived from a Czech word for slave, "robotnik").

If 'robot' isn't problematic, why is that? Is it because because the word is
more decoupled from its origin than 'slave,' or because the origin of the word
is less well known? Or is the negative-ness lost in translation?

[1] [https://muse.jhu.edu/article/215390](https://muse.jhu.edu/article/215390)

------
danharaj
All the discussion on this submission tells me is that it's not enough to
disagree with others, one also has to ridicule them and emphasize how stupid
they are for having a position one doesn't understand. Maybe even tie it to a
greater culture war where inferiors who don't deserve to be in tech are
ruining it for the ones already here. Stay hackernews, hackernews.

------
js2
My guess is that this was resubmitted due to this opinion piece the Washington
Post ran yesterday:

[https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/06/12/tech-
indu...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/06/12/tech-industry-has-
an-ugly-master-slave-problem/)

------
tinyhouse
He's right. Unfortunately there are many people like Mark. They fight
worthless fights and attack people who disagree with them. It's very American
to sweep problems under the carpet because of political correctness.

------
eloff
Between this and the commit replacing sexually charged hexspeak constants, I'm
shaking my head this morning.

It makes me want to be less politically correct on purpose just to troll the
kinds of people who advocate for this meaningless crap.

Words are not inherently offensive, if not used in an offensive manner. Can we
just all please go back to being grownups now?

------
krisgenre
What a coincidence! I was just reading
[https://redis.io/topics/replication](https://redis.io/topics/replication) few
hours back and when I saw this _leader-follower (master-slave)_ I couldn't
help but wonder why they were bringing in a new terminology.

------
retox
Allow me to be offended on behalf of you, and if you aren't offended then you
are a problem too.

~~~
ethbro
I think of it as:

1) I am personally offended, so you should be offended to.

2) If you are not offended, then because my personal offense is rooted in a
just cause, you are bad.

3) Because you are bad, I cannot have a dialog with you. Indeed, I should not
even try, because the cause is just.

MLK Jr had wise words on this, noticing the danger of a person convinced of
their own righteousness. Much of the non-violence playbook was predicated on
the tightrope that is (1) convincing someone to believe strongly in a cause &
(2) still act rationally enough to allow for discussion, negotiation, and
compromise outcomes.

------
jason0597
Flagged? Why guys?

------
loco5niner
Agree with antirez - this is not a problem.

However, the hecklers will probably end up having their way simply because
they do not have better things to do.

------
luord
I definitely disagree with some parts of the article, but his basic point on
the futility of giving way too much power to harmless words is sound.

So much so that I don't understand why this got flagged (while, for instance,
the one on github trying to change this wasn't).

------
mjw1007
On this subject: there's a conversation pattern that goes like this:

A: "Please change terminology X to Y because X is ethically bad, and Y is
clearer anyway."

B: "I disagree about Y being clearer."

A: "You're an evil partisan of ethical-problem-in-question."

I've seen this far too often and I think it's terrible.

I strongly recommend anyone who is advocating a terminology change to either
leave out the "and Y is clearer anyway" part, or be willing to discuss that
part independently of the ethical part.

------
sawaruna
This is a newer post about the topic but was flagged.
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23485533](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23485533)

------
Muromec
Could I take a moment to be offended by the mere existence of the word “slave”
and it being used in historical discussion about forced labor and treating
people as property, on behalf of all slavic people?

It’s ridiculous that Americans appropriate the name of my people to deal with
the problems of their own society.

~~~
xrd
I know you are just trying to make a point, but then, shouldn't we point out
that Americans didn't invent English nor the concept of slavery?

------
PresidentChuck
Fork it like GIMP and you can have your controller / agent

~~~
gruez
Didn't GIMP get forked because some people were offended by its name?

~~~
PresidentChuck
That's the point. Same as people getting offended by master-slave. If you
don't like it fork it. Controller/Agent is what I've been seeing lately.

------
hintymad
Oh, great. So much progressiveness. An article that was discussed two years
ago was quickly flagged today.

------
idoby
At this rate, looks like I'm about to be pursuing a Replica of Science
degree...

------
angryasian
what are people calling it instead of master / slave ?

------
mshron
Can a mod put [2018] in the title?

------
YeGoblynQueenne
Needs 2018 tag. I thought this was a reprise of the old discussion in light of
events in the USA. Instead, it's about something that happened two years ago.

------
dgellow
(2018)

------
travisoneill1
What does he mean that you can't say "fake news" on HN?

~~~
YeGoblynQueenne
I think he's talking about this conversation:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17818978](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17818978)

Click on parent a few times to get the full background.

(I found that by searching for "antirez fake news" in comments, btw, I don't
remember the conversation from the time it actually took place).

------
axaxs
I find the top comment to be the most insightful thing here, and wish everyone
who is running these campaigns would read it.

~~~
revx
Suspicious though, that the profile photo is a freely available stock image:
[https://pixabay.com/photos/fashion-afro-american-black-
peopl...](https://pixabay.com/photos/fashion-afro-american-black-
people-1835871/)

------
meddlepal
If you don't like what a project is doing then fork it and maintain it
yourself.

------
ianwalter
It doesn't matter if YOU don't think it's offensive. It's about how others
think and feel about it. Are people really so self-centered that they can't
understand that? And the slippery slope argument doesn't hold water because
it's very obvious when a good number of people have a problem with it vs one
or two people who are trying to be provocative. People are reasonable and if
they are telling you something bothers them, it most likely legitimately
bothers them.

~~~
adventured
> It doesn't matter if YOU don't think it's offensive. It's about how others
> think and feel about it.

Your premise actually means no feelings matter and it doesn't matter what
anybody thinks. It's self-collapsing and reveals the contradiction in what
you're proposing.

~~~
ianwalter
No it doesn't. It just means you can't rely on a single (your) viewpoint when
it comes to a large community-involved open source project. It's the
equivalent of "works on my machine".

------
unit-test
The Long March through the institutions.

If you wanted to breed radicalization, this how you'd do it.

[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_long_march_through_the_i...](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_long_march_through_the_institutions)

------
Asooka
You know, of all people, it is Slavs who should be the most offended at the
use of master-slave terminology. That's where the word comes from - "slave"
literally started out as "Slav person". But as an actual Slav, I find it very
hard to be offended. It's just a word, it can't hurt me and it doesn't imply
anything harmful. Of course, the politics du jour will dictate your reaction
to censorious demands, but I just find it a bit funny.

------
hartator
> was disappointed to see that Redis still uses the “master” and “slave”
> terminology in order to identify different roles in Redis replication.

What's funny to me, it's these people are against the terminology but not
against the concept. Like if you are against the words, why is okay for a
Redis node to be a slave and ordered around by a Redis master? Shouldn't all
Redis nodes be equal?

