Words matter

Developer André Staltz recently tweeted…

Software development still has a lot of terminology with a racist or patriarchal background. Let’s change that.

• Blacklist ➡ Denylist
• Whitelist ➡ Allowlist
• Killer app ➡ Beloved app
• Master/slave ➡ primary/replica

I hadn’t really thought about the connection between the words we use as developers and their connotations.

The master/slave one is obvious and terrible when take even a second to think about it, and I’m embarrassed I didn’t make this connection sooner. I love primary/replica, and I think it actually explains the relationship better.

Some people were quick to point out to André that blacklist has origins that predate the racial tensions and history of slavery in the US, but I’m not sure that matters all that much.

Those tensions and deep scars exist, and calling “the bad things” black and “the good things” white has racial undertones, whether that was the origin or not.

I’m committing to using new phrases for things like this. I hope you will, too.