[scrollaway]

> and it harms no one to finally get this accomplished

Doesn't it now?

See my detailed answer below [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10721003] as to why this sort of thing is actively harmful.

Sad to see HN downvoting legitimate discussion left and right, though. This is as bad as reddit.

[brighteyes]

I read that answer, and don't see it point out harm? You do mention some general harm in community friction and worry, and I do agree that is a concern - but that's happening anyhow right now. Yes, it's bad, but removing the word "slave" won't change that.

I do get the worry about overreach. Node.js has a PR that will automate looking for "problematic" words, which starts to sound Orwellian. However, the opposite extreme of "change no words no matter who is offended" can't work either. We need to find a reasonable middle ground.

It seems like removing "slave" is fairly reasonable - that's my feeling. What I find far more unreasonable are drive-by comments that complain without offering to do some work to help. But work to help is exactly what's happening in this (small part of this) story.

[siegecraft]

I read your answer and I don't think it's compelling.

A better reason is that naming things is hard, and changing master/slave to leader/follower dilutes the accuracy of the metaphor. That's why hard drives and databases, etc use master/slave, and consensus algorithms or self-organizing networks use leader/follower.

After all, if you don't lose meaning from changing the terms, there's nothing to argue aganst from a technical perspective. Then it just becomes your ideologies vs. their's and now people are arguing about politics in pull requests instead of being productive.