
Remove blacklist terminology · Issue #6475 · osquery/osquery - edward
https://github.com/osquery/osquery/issues/6475
======
oarsinsync
I think the most remarkable thing about that issue is that

* It got created and it got resolved

* There was no whining. It just got done.

There was an understanding that there was a code of conduct for the project,
and that this change met the spirit of upholding that code of conduct, and it
just _got done_.

If only everything in life was this simple.

EDIT: What's a shame, however, is that this is a shining example of good
conduct, and somehow it's disappeared from the front page in the time it took
me to read it and write this comment.

------
clemlais
From wikipedia:

The English dramatist Philip Massinger used the phrase "black list" in his
1639 tragedy The Unnatural Combat.[3]

After the Restoration of the English monarchy brought Charles II of England to
the throne in 1660, a list of regicides named those to be punished for the
execution of his father.[4] The state papers of Charles II say "If any
innocent soul be found in this black list, let him not be offended at me, but
consider whether some mistaken principle or interest may not have misled him
to vote".[5] In a 1676 history of the events leading up to the Restoration,
James Heath (a supporter of Charles II) alleged that Parliament had passed an
Act requiring the sale of estates, "And into this black list the Earl of Derby
was now put, and other unfortunate Royalists".[6]

Edward Gibbon wrote in The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire
(1776) of Andronicus that "His memory was stored with a black list of the
enemies and rivals, who had traduced his merit, opposed his greatness, or
insulted his misfortunes".[7]

------
BlackVanilla
Allowlist/denylist is clearer and more intuitive. This same pattern (bias free
communication resulting in clear communication and less injustice) can be seen
in other areas. I wrote this yesterday after Microsoft added a bias free
communication document, but it's as applicable here. [1]

At least in the UK, its laws and people would be better served if bias-free
communication is rigorously used when lawmaking. The Land Registration Act
2002 an example of statute law which unnecessarily and frequently uses
gendered words. [2] Sure, this is written in 2002, times have changed, but
this is considered a key statute governing UK land law. Even as recently as
2015, unnecessarily gendered language is used in the Consumer Rights Act 2015,
albeit not as consistently, but I'm sure more recent statutes also share this
trait. [3] This sloppiness in writing could cause needless issues.

Here's one. The UK's Foreign Office noted that the phrase 'pregnant women' in
general comment No. 36 on article 6 of the UN's International Covenant on
Civil and Political Rights on the right to life 'may be inadvertently
restricting the application of this paragraph to exclude transgender people
who have given birth; this has happened in two recent cases in the UK.' [4]

This issue is greater than everyday language in business, but the same type of
language used in our laws can potentially cost businesses by poorly-worded
contracts or by other means. Legislatures should use gender-neutral language
to make their laws clear and reduce potential needless unjustice.

[1]
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23439283](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23439283)
/ [https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/style-guide/bias-free-
commu...](https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/style-guide/bias-free-
communication)

[2]
[https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2002/9/section/24](https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2002/9/section/24)

[3]
[https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2015/15/pdfs/ukpga_2015...](https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2015/15/pdfs/ukpga_20150015_en.pdf#page=71)

[4]
[https://www.ohchr.org/Documents/HRBodies/CCPR/GCArticle6/Uni...](https://www.ohchr.org/Documents/HRBodies/CCPR/GCArticle6/UnitedKingdom.pdf#page=2)

~~~
haunter
>Legislatures should use gender-neutral language to make their laws clear and
reduce potential needless unjustice

In my mother tongue there are no gender-specific pronouns, there is just no
grammatical gender. It doesn't exist so this whole thing so foregin to me.

------
cvburgess
I think this is a great move for a number of reasons, but as one commenter
said, I think Allow/Deny are just simpler terms in general.

White/Black are abstractions and adds one more hurdle for folks new to the
industry - especially those from different languages and cultures where white
!= good and black != bad.

I think this is good for social reasons, but I hope the industry in general
moves away from black/white because its just not the best way to convey these
ideas, its just the one that stuck.

------
atonse
I was genuinely curious about the origin of this word based on these various
projects changing it.

And according to the Wikipedia (and the Oxford English Dictionary) [1], it
seems like blacklist came about something like 400 years ago in England. It
doesn't seem to be related to race.

Is there a movement that is tying those terms to race? Would love to see some
links about it. Because master/slave seems like a much more obvious set of
terms that we can and should get rid of (and replace with leader/follower,
primary/secondary, etc).

[1]:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blacklisting](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blacklisting)

~~~
jgwil2
Irrespective of origin, the terms seem to equate black to bad and white to
good, and as such should probably be retired. As other comments have
mentioned, allow and deny are more explicit and thus probably better terms
anyway.

~~~
atonse
I agree with you – allow/deny is easier to understand anyway for global non-
native speaker (which all open source projects are).

There are many practical reasons to do this, I just wasn't clear on the race-
related reasoning for blacklist/whitelist, as these words don't have those
etymologies.

The color black is associated with many non-racial things that we do deem
negative, things like death with black clothes at funerals, things like the
darkness being the absence of light (sunlight is brighter/whiter), being
blinded, where we do mostly see black. None of those things are racial, what
should we do about all those?

Perhaps a better change is to stop associating our skin color with those words
which are clearly inaccurate, and serve absolutely no useful purpose.

~~~
jgwil2
I agree that'd be great, but between changing the world's use of black and
white and changing our use of blacklist and whitelist as pertains to software,
one is in our power and the other isn't. Who knows, maybe someone will even
feel more welcomed in our profession as a result.

~~~
atonse
Why would one feel unwelcome? We just established the word has nothing to do
with race.

------
CM30
Hmm, wonder what they'd think about some other tech terminology then?

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Master/slave_(technology)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Master/slave_\(technology\))

Or talks of this in typesetting?

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

But seriously, this is silly. Words and phrases can have multiple meanings,
and they can be used for perfectly innocuous reasons in various fields.

~~~
noble_pleb
Exactly, this is just going to open up a pandora's box. What about black box
testing, is that racist too? And english terms like blacksmith and black-belt?

There are terms like "blue-collar vs white-collar" too which (according to
some) deems the physical labor class as inferior to the "white" intellectual
class. And there are general english phrases too like "things aren't always
black and white, there is a lot of grey area in between".

~~~
jgwil2
Those terms don't explicitly attach a moral value to colors in the way that
the blacklist/whitelist terminology does.

~~~
ThA0x2
Blacklist/whitelist do not attach moral values to color either. Do you have a
peer reviewed study that states these words attach moral values?

Being blacklisted can be a morally good thing. An example: You can be
blacklisted from a gang's kill list because you did good deeds for the
neighborhood.

The only people attaching moral values to these are people trying to gaslight
others into believing "black=bad".

------
nfg
Perfectly sensible, issues like this are automatically detected and enforced
in shipping codebases where I work. As a commenter on the issue says the
result is frankly clearer and more understandable anyway.

