The main codebase of the Go language changes that the phrases whitelist/blacklist and master/slave from source texts and documentation, a rejection of which has intensified amid the ongoing protests in the USA. The terms 'whitelist' and 'blacklist' have been replaced with 'allowlist' and 'blocklist,' and 'master' and 'slave' have been changed, depending on the context, to 'process,' 'pty,' 'proc,' and 'control.'
The change will not result in a loss of backward compatibility or confusion, as most of the modifications pertain to comments, tests, and internal variables. The replacement of master/slave has recently become a standard practice; for example, two years ago projects
and . The terms allowlist/blocklist are self-explanatory and better describe their essence than the established terms whitelist/blacklist, which sound harsh to non-specialists.
It has been noted that developers are not trying to reignite discussions about terminology in tech projects. To eliminate unwanted terms, it is sufficient that there are people who feel offended, marginalized, and reminded of past discrimination by these phrases. Due to historical reasons and social context, the use of these phrases in contemporary society has come to be regarded as offensive and is condemned. Opponents of renaming argue that politics and programming should not be mixed; these are merely terms that have already established meanings in computer science, and the negative connotation is imposed by artificial notions of political correctness, making it difficult to use plain English.
Source: opennet.ru
