Re: SV: Diversity and offensive terminology in RFCs

[Michael StJohns <[e-mail]>]

On 9/20/2018 1:09 PM, Evan Hunt wrote:
> I think the issue with "man-in-the-middle" isn't that it's offensive,
> per se, but that the unnecessary use of gendered terminology tends to
> reinforce mental biases.  In my lifetime in the US, we've largely shifted
> from "fireman" and "mailman" and "stewardess" to "firefighter" and "mail
> carrier" and "flight attendant" for similar reasons.  "Man-in-the-middle"
> carries with it a subtle, unnecessary suggestion that the clever indivdual
> between Alice and Bob is probably named Carl not Carol.

Generically, there are some differences between the swap to non-gendered 
nouns and terms like man-in-the-middle.  The former reflects the 
reasonable desire to allow people to choose what they'll be called or 
how they're referred to - there are other examples that are obvious.   
But "man-in-the-middle" is just a term of art - one that's succinct and 
in our context unmistakable.

I'm concerned we're again off in the weeds here.  English has a lot of 
words with overloaded meanings and multiple definitions and others that 
do not. For example - whitelist and blacklist have pretty much singular 
meanings related to acceptance or rejection, while master has a 
bunch.    OED says blacklist goes back to at least 1619.  See a 
discussion on this about 10 years ago at 
http://garysaid.com/are-the-terms-whitelist-and-blacklist-racist/

Lastly, words can have cultural overlays that are not obvious. 
Continuing from Adrian's bundle of sticks, a similar word is a synonym 
for a cigarette and another similar word expression is a synonym for 
being tired.  The latter definition appearing around 1450 according to 
dictionary.com.

For better or for worse, we have our jargon (and invent it at dizzying 
rates with every RFC), we borrow jargon from related fields, and we base 
the remainder of text on established English (please don't use twerk in 
your RFC's!).    Let's not see shadows that have not yet overtaken us.   
And please - let's not require Heather and the RFC folks to become our 
word conscience.

If you feel strongly about this AND you're authoring a draft or RFC - by 
all means, wordsmith to your hearts content.  Please use words that lead 
to only one meaning in context where those words are necessary and try 
not to invent new ones.

Later, Mike