Master/Slave

[Rocky]

From Snopes.com: (http://www.snopes.com/inboxer/outrage/master.asp)

Claim: The County of Los Angeles has requested that equipment vendors avoid using the industry term "Master/Slave" in product descriptions and labelling.

Status: True.

Origins: Social
changes of our era have been accompanied by linguistic changes: as discrimination based upon race, gender, or physical condition has become less socially acceptable, we began to frown upon the use of pejorative terms associated with race, moved towards more gender-neutral usages of language (e.g., 'chairperson' instead of 'chairman'), and replaced terms for describing the disabled with less stigmatizing ones (e.g., 'mentally handicapped' rather than 'retarded').

[Tmy]

Master/Slave is sooooooooo Windows 98. The truley hip lable them "whitey" and "brotherman".

[Wolverine]

Heard about this yesterday.

Unbelievable...

[PogoPedant]

My favourite from OS-classes: 'The advantage of this, is that only parents can kill their children. Processes whose parents are dead are called zombies.'

[Luke T.]

What would be an alternative to Master/Slave? Primary/Secondary doesn't quite work.

Superior/Subordinate?

[arcticpenguin]

Originally posted by Luke T.
What would be an alternative to Master/Slave? Primary/Secondary doesn't quite work.

Superior/Subordinate?
Node 0 and node 1?

[Nyarlathotep]

This is the sort of nonsense that makes me bang my head against my desk really, really hard.

What makes this brand of idiocy doubly frustrating is that it enables people to make up a political correctness strawman whenever someone objects to something truly offensive.

[Rocky]

What are they going to do when a “Slave” Cylinder goes out on one of the county’s trucks? Replace the “node 1” or the “Subordinate” cylinder?

[Kodiak]

I think next we should all boycott the Depeche Mode classic song "Master and Servant"... :rolleyes:

[Luke T.]

Sponsor/Dependent.

[Nyarlathotep]

Originally posted by Rocky
What are they going to do when a “Slave” Cylinder goes out on one of the county’s trucks? Replace the “node 1” or the “Subordinate” cylinder?

I guess the whole county will have to get rid of all of those nasty old "Master Copies" of all those forms that they have while they are at it. And art museums can no longer show the works of the great Dutch "masters". That Grand Master chess tournament is going to have to cancelled too.

[Tmy]

This just in. Manchester, New Hampshire will now be known as PERSONCHESTER.

[Luke T.]

Originally posted by Nyarlathotep


I guess the whole county will have to get rid of all of those nasty old "Master Copies" of all those forms that they have while they are at it. And art museums can no longer show the works of the great Dutch "masters". That Grand Master chess tournament is going to have to cancelled too.

No more slaving over a hot stove, either. But the women figured that out in the 60s.....

[Luke T.]

Caesar/Spartucus. Yeah. That's it.

[Crossbow]

How about Top/Bottom?

;)

[Nyarlathotep]

Originally posted by Luke T.


No more slaving over a hot stove, either. But the women figured that out in the 60s.....

Refering to one's boss as "That Slavedriver" is right out too, I guess.

[Nyarlathotep]

Well, at least I have now heard of something even more stupid. I mentioned this snopes article to a co-worker. He used to work for St. Mary's, a Catholic run hospital. He used to do much of their computer work and he tells me that in the procedures manual, they were specifically told never to use the word "abort" under any circumstances, even when referring to ending a program.

People can be so stupid sometimes...

[Luke T.]

It's a good thing "masturbate" is spelled the way it is, or we'd all be doomed....

[JamesM]

equal/more equal than others, that's my suggestion.

[Nyarlathotep]

We could always borrow S&M lingo and refer to them as Dominant/Submissive

[Mercutio]

Originally posted by Nyarlathotep
We could always borrow S&M lingo and refer to them as Dominant/Submissive Crossbow beat you to it, with "top" and "bottom". Now, how did he know that....?

[deanerk]

How about pimp/hoe?

[Brown]

I've written about this before, but I'll mention it again. In one of my first jobs, I worked with an administrative agency that regulated public utilities. A directive came down from the pointy-haired governor's office that "sexist language" was to be removed from agency rules. Moreover, someone had slogged through our rules and had identified the following terms as possibly sexist:

"male connector" and "female connector"
"man-hours"

And the one that really took the cake: "guy wire."

The same mentality may be at work with this master-slave business. Katz ("Contemporary Logic Design," 1994) uses "master-slave" terminology to describe constructs such as certain memory elements called J-K flip-flops. He notes, however, that in some contexts the "master" is called the "requester" or "client," and the "slave" is called the "provider" or "server."

[American]

We can all thank the politically correct, zero-tolerance 1990s for this. That, and the fact that many state workers have nothing better to do than write memos that try and justify their jobs even existing at the expense of taxpayers.

[Marc]

as discrimination based upon race, gender, or physical condition has become less socially acceptable, we began to frown upon the use of pejorative terms associated with race, moved towards more gender-neutral usages of language

But this directive is discriminitory!! It discriminates against alternative lifestyles!
http://members.cox.net/draft2/Smileys/MODhappyslk.gif http://members.cox.net/draft2/Smileys/whip3.gif

:D

[Hexxenhammer]

Cthulhu / Cultist

[EvilBiker]

Originally posted by Rocky
...(e.g., 'chairperson' instead of 'chairman'), and...

No, no, you've got it all wrong! It's "chairperCHILD", dammit!

I'm not kidding...you try live through a social revolution someday :p

[MoeFaux]

M/S, Top/Bottom, Dom/Sub. Let's not forget Sir/Miss. Or if you're really fun Mistress/Sissyboy.

[Rocky]

PC/LAC

(Political Correctness/Los Angles County)

[renata]

My tax dollars at work!

Apparently, this was done in response to a complaint

http://www.cnn.com/2003/TECH/ptech/11/26/master.term.reut/index.html


LOS ANGELES, California (Reuters) -- Los Angeles officials have asked that manufacturers, suppliers and contractors stop using the terms "master" and "slave" on computer equipment, saying such terms are unacceptable and offensive.

The request -- which has some suppliers furious and others busy re-labeling components -- came after an unidentified worker spotted a videotape machine carrying devices labeled "master" and "slave" and filed a discrimination complaint with the county's Office of Affirmative Action Compliance.
.....

Dennis Tafoya, director of the affirmative action office, said in a separate memo that an "exhaustive search" had been undertaken to find all such labels and replace them with more "appropriate" ones. A form was sent to all departments to identify equipment carrying the labels "master" and "slave" or any other offensive terms.
......
Sandoval said that he had already rejected a suggestion that the county stop buying all equipment carrying the "master" and "slave" labels and had no intention of enforcing a ban on such terms with suppliers.

"But we are culturally sensitive and we have 90,000 employees," he said. "We have to take these things seriously."

Sandoval added that in addition to the e-mails he's received "telling me how stupid I am and how I should be fired" he has gotten a positive response from some companies willing to reexamine their labels.

In June, the Los Angeles city council unanimously passed a law requiring that any companies doing business with the city disclose profits they may have made from slavery in the 19th Century. In 2000, the council supported federal legislation seeking reparations for descendants of slaves.

[BobK]

PC idiocy in full bloom.

I suppose they'll also replace the bios chips in all their computers.

Not to mention rewriting a lot of construction trade regulations concerning master plumbers, electricians, carpenters etc.

I really can't understand why California is heavily in debt.:rolleyes:

[TillEulenspiegel]

Brown is correct except the flip-flop existed in discrete components pre-70's and so did the nomenclature.

In fact the terms were used for discrete relay logic controls as early as the 50's and before that in mechanics i.e. Automobile master/slave brake cylinders.

In computers, nets, automation the term server/client works ...as for the PC folks all I can say is osculate my Caucasian gluteus maximus you mentally challenged people ( without respect to national,religious or racial origins).

[Cecil]

Just another example of some ignorant person noticing industry-specific jargon and noticing that it has other connotations when taken out of context. Never once in my life have I thought about slavery when setting the jumpers on hard drives. Master and slave, in the context of computers, just doesn't conjure up images of the slave trade.

On another note, how petty do you have to be to actually take offense at this? Don't you have more important things going on in your mind than to be emotionally hurt by the words printed on the back of a VCR?

[Skeptic]

an unidentified worker spotted a videotape machine carrying devices labeled "master" and "slave" and filed a discrimination complaint with the county's Office of Affirmative Action Compliance.

Unbelievable. I'd rename master/slave components WASP/****** components, just to piss this idiot off.

[The Fool]

Originally posted by Skeptic
an unidentified worker spotted a videotape machine carrying devices labeled "master" and "slave" and filed a discrimination complaint with the county's Office of Affirmative Action Compliance.

Unbelievable. I'd rename master/slave components WASP/****** components, just to piss this idiot off.
Or in the Case of Microsoft software how about....

Doesn't work/ doesn't work without the first bit working.

[peptoabysmal]

In my previous life as a professional photographer (meaning only that I made a living from it) we used "slave" flash units all the time. The main flash goes off and the slave sensor triggers on the slave unit, providing fill lighting.

I haven't seen one of those "multimedia" master / slave controller / projector setups in production operation since somewhere around the 80's. We ran one a couple of years ago to put on a nostalgia show about the 60's and 70's.

How about using programming nomenclature like a parent / child realtionship? That sounds touchy-feely enough, doesn't it?

[Cecil]

Originally posted by peptoabysmal
How about using programming nomenclature like a parent / child realtionship? That sounds touchy-feely enough, doesn't it? That's blatantly offensive to all those infertile couples who are unable to have children. How dare we rub it in their faces like that?

[Dorian Gray]

So odd. This thread came up in another forum I do, and parallels it. It has the male-female plugs, and even the 'Master and Servant' reference (I made it).


http://forums.crgaming.com/eqbb/viewtopic.php?t=90669

(I am Omnipotus there)

[michaellee]

Are there any colleges located within Los Angeles County?
If so, they now must rename all past and future MASTER'S degrees. Or I will be offended.

A synonym for master is owner.
All descriptions, terms and words currently used must be renamed immediately.

Another synonym for master is controller.
Now I know why the 'State Controller's office' has offended for so long!

Another synonym for master is keeper.
Just don't get caught saying 'now that's a keeper'.

Another synonym for master is captain.
The military rank of captain must be renamed!
All airline pilots can no longer be called captain. Or I will sue.

Another synonym for master is employer.
Boy, do the federal government and all state governments have a major problem on their hands!
Naw, just create a new 'department of linguistics', raise taxes to fund it, and we will all be satisfied.

Another synonym for master is Jesus.
No comment.

A synonym for slave is server.
To Linux, Microsoft, Sun, and others, you are now officially fuc....

All food servers(waitresses, waiters) must be renamed.

Since service is derived from server which is derived from slave;
military service, food service, customer service, room service..... need I go on?

Another synonym for slave is body.
Any word containing the letters 'body' or 'bodies' are irreprehensibly offensive to me and must be renamed.

Another synonym for slave is drudge.
Oh Matt, guess what?

[The Don]

Originally posted by Tmy
This just in. Manchester, New Hampshire will now be known as PERSONCHESTER.

That place name is a politcally correct minefield...

Can't have "Man" as you pointed out
"Chest" wuold have to be pixelated
"New" implies ageism
"Ham" is offensive to Muslims, Jews, Buddhists and vegetarians
"shire" is horse breed specific

It should be correctly rendered as "Personpectoraler Age-independent Curedfoodstuffequine"

[KingRat]

Originally posted by Rocky
From Snopes.com: (http://www.snopes.com/inboxer/outrage/master.asp)

Claim: The County of Los Angeles has requested that equipment vendors avoid using the industry term "Master/Slave" in product descriptions and labelling.

Status: True.

Idiocy level at 110% and climbing...and they can deny it all they like, it's still political correctness run amok.