Re: IESG Statement On Oppressive or Exclusionary Language

[John Levine <[e-mail]>]

In article <[e-mail]> you write:
>-=-=-=-=-=-
>Hi Victor,
>I think I may not have described what I was suggesting clearly enough. I wasn’t proposing any fixed (i.e.,
>MANDATORY or MUST) rules. I was trying to avoid problems caused by the perception that people inside IETF would
>be identifying what words were problematic (using their own subjective criteria, and where the decision makers
>are not members of the demographics perceived to be slighted by the words), and that use of these words would be
>strictly prohibited. ...

Unfortunately, that's much too simplistic. There are lots of words
where the context is crucial. To take a familiar example, Master is a
problem in the sense of someone who owns a slave, but not in the sense
of someone who knows all about a topic. My daughter got a Master of
Arts degree this year and I don't expect her to give it back.

Certainly some words we should never use at all, like **** and !*%&#
but we never use them in I-D's anyway.

R's,
John

PS: Then there's words like "niggardly."