Check out this thread from two years ago where people argue that the opposite phrase is sexist. I guess they figure "not your daddy's VCS" is sexist because it excludes women from the set of individuals who might have a need for a VCS.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3931048

In summary, any allusion to gender with regard to tech is inevitably interpreted as sexist by someone.

The phrases have different connotations, so they aren't actually true opposites.

Take a different example, say you described Git as:

* a man's version control system

or let's say you described it as:

* a woman's version control system

The male/female "binary" doesn't make them opposite and using one doesn't cancel out the sexism in the other, they just are sexist in different ways.

Your example is not the same because your phrasing carries the implicit assumption that the version control system has qualities that make it explicitly suited for use by a specific gender. The two HN headlines are each describing parents; a group who are stereotypically characterized as being out of sync with the latest and greatest trends and advances. The reader has to take the extra step to interpret the headline as a subtly sexist chide, because there is nothing sexist about VCS and there is nothing sexist about the implication that your mother or father uses an outdated version of VCS software.

The male/female "binary" doesn't make them opposite

Yes, you're the best kind of correct, but let's not get caught up in semantics, the binary you so aptly point out is exactly what I'm taking about, 0 is the opposite of 1, and mom is the opposite of dad.

and using one doesn't cancel out the sexism in the other, they just are sexist in different ways.

This is only true if the use of feminine and masculine descriptions when discussing tech is inherently sexist, otherwise I don't see what either headline has to do with sex. Take your logic a little bit further and you might as well label gendered pronouns as sexist since they imply the sex of the subject.

I can't even begin to parse what you're saying here.

Mom is not the opposite of dad, they are just paired ideas. This isn't semantics, this is plain simple reality. We sometimes think of them as binaries but they aren't actually so.

The opposite of a Mom is a not-Mom, a concept which can include Dad but can also include a woman who hasn't had children.

"This is only true if the use of feminine and masculine descriptions when discussing tech is inherently sexist"

I wasn't arguing about anything being inherently sexist, I was arguing that it was contextually sexist. If you don't understand that words have connotations, people's reactions to sexism will always seem mysterious and arbitrary to you.

"Take your logic a little bit further and you might as well label gendered pronouns as sexist since they imply the sex of the subject"

You obviously don't understand my logic and are arguing about something completely different.

It can also be sexist in different ways depending on the context in which the phrase is said.

A radical feminist programmer saying "Now THAT is a woman's version control system."

A brogrammer saying "Pshh. That's a woman's version control system."

Isn't it just ageist? After all, it implies that your mom already has a bitcoin daemon but your new one is better.

Indeed. It pretty clearly implies your mom does have a bitcoin daemon, thus making her a nerdy mom.

Having said that, the article would get more upvotes here if the headline mentioned it was written in Go. ;-)

no it obviously implies your mom is using an outdated bitcoind because she is a woman and knows nothing about computers; your father isn't clueless about tech. Sexist!

While your mom is not using this wallet, you cannot complain about sexism in this title.

The stupid choice of strapline means this product will always have this kind of comment whenever it's discussed. Rightly so, IMO. It's the 21st century and someone would have to be a fucking idiot to not realise that this strapline is going to cause comment.

Are you also offended by the saying, "Not your father's NASA?"

I was wrong to be offended. It was a knee-jerk reaction.

The phrase is a common American form of wording. "Not your mother's romance"; "Not your father's oldsmobile"; and so on.

So in this example my mother does have a bitcoin wallet but this new wallet is a bobby-dazzler.

I need to pause before posting.

People eventually have to communicate, and someone is going to take offense no matter what. I think it's reasonable to expect people to start somewhere away from the worst possible interpretation.

i think it's a pretty good line - got all of you talking, didn't it? =)

No, the intended meaning is clearly not the pedantic one you are claiming should be used.

The intended meaning is that your parents are less technically capable than you are; which parent is specifically chosen is simply not relevant. Would you have preferred, "Not your Dad's bitcoin wallet?" This is not sexist, it is ageist.

Oh for fuck's sake. Do we really, absolutely need to drag political correctness into every god damned issue?

The best way to get people to stop talking about political correctness is to be politically correct. Pragmatically speaking, it makes sense to make a good effort to not offend people in your writing, since it detracts from the core message.

At some point there exists a line where you stop caring if people on the other side of it are offended, because they are nothing but a loud, vocal minority looking for a reason to complain.

I think that making an "ism" out of this headline applies. I don't know about you, but I'm not about to make language grey and boring just because certain people choose to take offense at anything and everything.

Yes, I'm well aware this is hyperbole. Deal.

It's not ageist. It merely implies technology get's better with time. I can say "Not my dad's computer" and the implication isn't that my dad sucked at computers, its that computers sucked when my dad first got one.

What aspect of the headline is sexist?

Some similar expression is "not your dad's rock music", implying that your dad listens to rock music. In this case, the headline implies that your mom uses some kind of Bitcoin daemon, ergo she is a nerdy mom.