Have you ever run a sanity check on server? Perhaps had a service that’s hung?
Maybe you’ve had a housekeeping script, or wondered if a particular platform supports something natively?
Well, next time you look in the mirror, you’ve got a low-down, dirty bigot looking back at you and you should be ashamed at the incredibly insensitive language you’re using.
According to the new Inclusive Language Guide they’ve endorsed, most of the language that IT people use to discuss services, software, and projects is downright disgusting.
Check out some of the condemnations:
Instead of “black hat” and “white hat”, you must say “malicious hacker” and “approved hacker”. Ironically hacker itself is a co-opted word whose originally meaning has been subverted.
You can’t say “housekeeping” because…people shouldn’t keep house? Strange, because “housekeeper” is hardly a gendered term. Instead you must say “cleanup” or “maintenance” or “logistics”.
“Sanity Check”? How dare you, you ableist.
You can’t say “normal” or “abnormal” because…reasons? Instead you say “typical” or “atypical”.
“Dummy”? You might as well be spitting on people in wheelchairs.
“Hung” is labeled “violent Language that practices a degree of aggression”.
You’d be forgiven for thinking this was an Onion article, but it’s something the Linux Foundation actually believes in.
If everyone took these suggestions seriously, they would quickly turn into euphemism treadmills. Today we can’t say “normal” – tomorrow they’d be horrified someone says “typical” and would be suggesting a new term.
But really, who would take these ideas seriously?
“Avoid using idioms and jargons,” is another key recommendation. I’m not sure how someone has a conversation about information technology without using information technology jargon. Can we no longer use terms like “CPU”, “network”, and “compiler”?
Suggestions
The list seems to have a lot of room for improvement, in my opinion. Here are some terms they missed:
Horsepower: deeply inconsiderate to horses (and those who identify as equines), since they did not consent to their strength being commodified for mechanical comparisons.
Primary/Secondary: these terms practically scream hierarchy, if not patriarchy.
Firewall: may be alarming to those with a history of house fires or fear of walls. I suggest using “Boundary of Warmth.”
Bug: derogatory toward insects, portraying them as inherently problematic when they’re just trying to live their best lives.
Thread: offensive to knitters, as it trivializes the noble art of textile creation for mere CPU scheduling.
Deadlock: insensitive to those dealing with jammed doors or locksmith trauma. And the violence!
Fork: can cause distress to spoons and knives by implying cutlery hierarchy.
Cloud: could upset people who live in perpetually sunny climates and feel cloud-excluded.
Ping: might offend submariners who still have flashbacks from Cold War sonar drills.
Mouse: unfairly stigmatizes rodents, who do not deserve to be synonymous with point-and-click servitude.
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raindog308 (LowEndBox)
![A screenshot of the LWN.net home page taken 02 Sep 2025. The headlines are:
- GNOME loses another executive director
- [$] The future of 32-bit support in the kernel
- Kernel prepatch 6.17-rc4
- Bcachefs goes to "externally maintained"
- [$] The challenge of maintaining curl
These match those shown in the GNOME 1.4 virtual machine.](https://fedi.ml/photo/preview/640/700001 "A screenshot of the LWN.net home page taken 02 Sep 2025. The headlines are:
- GNOME loses another executive director
- [$] The future of 32-bit support in the kernel
- Kernel prepatch 6.17-rc4
- Bcachefs goes to \"externally maintained\"
- [$] The challenge of maintaining curl
These match those shown in the GNOME 1.4 virtual machine.")
![A screenshot of the GNOME 1.4 desktop running in QEMU. There is a 'Start Here' Nautilus (the file manager) window open. The window has a side bar with several tabs to choose from. News is selected and shows:
LWN.net
- GNOME loses another executive director
- [$] The future of 32-bit support in the kernel
- Kernel prepatch 6.17-rc4
- Bcachefs goes to "externally maintained"
- [$] The challenge of maintaining curl](https://fedi.ml/photo/preview/640/699999 "A screenshot of the GNOME 1.4 desktop running in QEMU. There is a 'Start Here' Nautilus (the file manager) window open. The window has a side bar with several tabs to choose from. News is selected and shows:
LWN.net
- GNOME loses another executive director
- [$] The future of 32-bit support in the kernel
- Kernel prepatch 6.17-rc4
- Bcachefs goes to \"externally maintained\"
- [$] The challenge of maintaining curl")
