Re:Stanford's “Elimination of Harmful Language” Initiative
by tsimionescu on Thursday December 22, 2022 @02:54AM
(#34090927)
Thank you for the references! This does change my opinion of whether it makes sense to rename the master branch (though, thankfully, in programming I really haven't heard anyone refer to slave branches).
> Sorry, but I don't see any world where a small committee in the IT department holds sway over the entire org.
In my experience from how corporations work, it is quite typical to have some small group in some centralized department (typically HR for internal language decisions, but it can be Marketing/PR or IT as well) make sweeping decisions for the entire organization, only sometimes needing additional buy-in from 1-2 C-level execs. I don't know how different the dynamics are in Stanford, but given my understanding that private universities are more and more being run like corporations, I assume it's not outside the realm of possibility.
At the very least, I quite doubt that all of the faculty were consulted and a democratic vote was held to agree on the need for a list such as this, let alone on its actual contents.
> Sorry, but I don't see any world where a small committee in the IT department holds sway over the entire org.
In my experience from how corporations work, it is quite typical to have some small group in some centralized department (typically HR for internal language decisions, but it can be Marketing/PR or IT as well) make sweeping decisions for the entire organization, only sometimes needing additional buy-in from 1-2 C-level execs. I don't know how different the dynamics are in Stanford, but given my understanding that private universities are more and more being run like corporations, I assume it's not outside the realm of possibility.
At the very least, I quite doubt that all of the faculty were consulted and a democratic vote was held to agree on the need for a list such as this, let alone on its actual contents.