Origin of the term "black list" and "white list"
 

Rosie has had me in tears of laughter today. One of the people she works with is in charge of the bluecat email filtering system, which, as most do, works by using the concepts of blacklist and whitelists.

The chap who manages this has had an email from, the "Human Rights/Diversity Advisor" officer (but we'll call them "PC nutbar" for arguments sake). The email states that the term blacklist needs to be changed as it's a negative racial sterotype in the way the email depicts it:


Terminolgy
Blacklist - Bad/SPAM email blocked and disallowed delivery.
Whitelist - Good email allowed/permitted for delivery.


In other words the PC nutbar is saying they can't use the term blacklist as it's obvisouly indicating that black people are bad.

I mentioned that maybe, just maybe, someone should tell this nutter that these are industry terms and not offencive furthermore, and here's why I'm asking the question, I think the terms origin comes from the ballot method which uses black balls for an rejection of a vote and a white ball for an acceptance.

Now, I'd quite like to be able to point out the PC madness to this woman by quoting where the terms blacklist and whitelist came from. As said above I think I can see where they might have been derrived from, but I'd appreciate it if someone could provide me with a link to somewhere that states where they come from (I do have a wikipeida link on "black ball", which will probably do).

See here Markus. According to them, blacklist is a synonym of blackball.

Some people really are best ignored, for the sake of our sanity. Not so long ago, there was a suggestion that the electronics industry should stop using the terms 'master' and 'slave' to describe the relationship between two pieces of interconnected equipment.

I would have laughed, but in the current climate, the danger of such suggestions actually being taken seriously is too great for it to be truly funny :(

Can't you stress to them the irony of being a 'diversity advisor' when they're trying to reduce the diversity of vocabulary used within the workplace. In other words, THEY are discriminating against certain words. It's no fair on the words, they have feelings to you know :D

You should tell them that you are offended by the fact that they refer to electronic communications as "email", and suggest they use something more gender neutral. :D

So when I'm not overdrawn I'm "in the black"

I suppose the 'Diversity Advisor' would be happy that I'm doing my bit for intercultural relations ;)

Jerome,
Thanks for the link, I'll pass it along (btw - curry night is needed sometime soon :))

Andy,
I do recall something on slashdot about the master/slave designation thing.

Political correctness has gone way way to far IMHO.

The gf is back from blighty tomorrow, so watch this space! :)

Jerome, Excellent!

BTW - the chap who got the email has been tempted to reply saying that if they were meant to offensive they would have been called "badnigger" and "goodcracker" lists :D

He is being dared to change them to the aforementioned names, but I doubt he will.

The term comes from the Freemason organisation. You apply to join your local lodge, they have a private vote to see if they want you. They have this vote by individually going into a closed room and placing either a white ball or a black ball in a cloth bag. The grand master would then open the bag in view of all the members. If you get one blackball you are not allowed to join. The reasons for getting a black ball would either be that you are Jewish, RC, black/coloured or you had personally pissed off a member of the lodge. Once you got blackballed, you also got put on a 'blacklist', where other masons wouldn't use your services or buy your produce, but instead direct their custom towards people on the 'whitelist'
He probably has a point in that saying blacklist refers originally to a process of discrimination against non WASPs. Suggest he uses the term Sh1tlist instead :D

I suppose 'chavlist' would be a no no as well?

Wikipedia's definition doesn't mention anything politically-incorrect that I can see. I reckon it's also a technical term. Ain't nobody changin' technical terms.

Exactly, its a precedence in language like red is hot and blue is cold. The "dark side", "black mood".... darkness is irrevocably linked to negativity, it's nothing to do with discriminating against someone due to the colour of their skin, otherwise fake tan wouldn't be such a best seller! ;)

These PC oddballs must spend their lives trawling around to see what they can find just so they can make a fuss about it.

Yes they should be ignored but the trouble is they have inveigled themselves into positions of power supported by the general administration and therefore have the ability to foist this sort of rubbish on the rest of us. The bad effects of this and their liberalism are getting pretty obvious now and until the attitudes of authority are changed it will just go on.

Hard to say what to do about it except change those who are in authority to more enlightened leaders.

Les

political correctness gone bonkers!

I wouldn't work for a company that had a "Human Rights/Diversity Advisor".

Get the guy to e-mail the non-gender-specific person and tell them to get on to the facilities manager first. Electrical connections have male and female connections and, to be perfectly frank, there's no need to expose sensitve souls to such sexually explicit naming conventions in the work place ! Imagine the poor females having to insert the male connector into the female one's. And as for the gays - they'd be stood there with two plugs or two sockets getting all confused about their connections and how they should be inserted !

You should also suggest they they make sure the ladies toilets have the same number of urinals as the mens. - Its only fair to give them the same choices :D

I believe being in the black at the bank refers to the colour of ink that used to be used in ledgers when black and red ink was used.

A semi-related story: We were supposed to have a talk a couple of weeks back from the health and safety officer about boxes that were obstructing a fire exit in our office. He had to rescedule the talk as he had fallen off a ladder at the weekend and injured himself :lol1:

I heard that black catholics are asking for a change in procedures for electing Pope when white smoke is used........

How come in Snooker potting Black is worth more than potting pink - They'll have to change the rules so you get 6.5 points for each and you can put them in any order - Racist Snooker authorities :mad:

We're not allowed to discuss anything relating to race on SN.

We must comply.

We must NOT have opinion.


....and yes there really are some sad wankers on here.

Nah - 21 grey balls all worth 7 points that must be potted without prejudice in any order in any pocket but without favouring a pocket. :D

How about Socialist Poker?
Whoever wins the hand shares their money equally between all the players at the end of the hand. :lol1:

Woah!! What about Brown and Yellow you racist pig!! :D ;)

They're insignificant little balls.

As for the fcuking Greens - don't get me started ;):D