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\begin{document}

\title{Inclusivity bugs and the language we use}



\author[1]{Mark C. Miller}%
\affil[1]{Affiliation not available}%


\vspace{-1em}



  
  \date{June 16, 2024}


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If we knew many terms and phrases we commonly use such as, for
example,~\emph{sanity check}, \emph{grandfathered}, \emph{ladies and
gentlemen~}or \emph{low man on the totem pole} can discourage coworkers,
colleagues, collaborators and other potential contributors from
participating in our projects with their full authentic selves, would we
still use them?\selectlanguage{english}
\begin{figure}[H]
\begin{center}
\includegraphics[width=0.70\columnwidth]{figures/apollo-plaques/apollo-plaques}
\caption{{The language used in the plaques left at first and last Moon landing
sites.
{\label{255238}}%
}}
\end{center}
\end{figure}

When Armstrong first set foot upon the Moon, he said \emph{``This is a
small step for a~\textbf{man} but a giant leap
for~\textbf{man}kind.''~}Minutes later, responding to President Nixon,
he said\textsuperscript{1} \emph{``It is a great honor\ldots{}to be here
representing\ldots{}\textbf{men} of peaceable nations, \textbf{men} with
an interest and a curiosity, and \textbf{men~}with a vision for the
future.''}

Taken out context of the 1960s, the repeated use of \textbf{man}
and~\textbf{men} certainly doesn't read very much like space exploration
included women. More importantly, however, it also didn't sound that way
to many of the \textasciitilde{}650 million listeners\textsuperscript{2}
at the time. Worse, even~\emph{current} writings about the Apollo space
program tend to parrot the same language using phrases like \emph{when
\textbf{man} first walked on the Moon} or what a \emph{great achievement
it was for~\textbf{man}kind} .

To help skeptics empathize, imagine if instead of a crew of all white,
Christian men as the first Apollo mission was (maybe all Apollo
missions), the first mission to Mars is crewed by all Black, Muslim
women and the first to walk on Mars says something like~\emph{``This is
a small step for a woman but a giant leap for woman-kind\ldots{}Allahu
Akbar.''}

Joanna Lee,\textsuperscript{3} a contributor to the Inclusive Naming
Initiative\textsuperscript{4} and author of inclusive language
guidelines on inclusiveprism.org\textsuperscript{5}, calls the use of
such language in software projects an \emph{inclusivity bug} because it
creates barriers to full participation by all stakeholders. Inclusivity
bugs arise out of the use of language that discourages whole groups of
people, often from underrepresented and/or historically oppressed
populations, from contributing as their full authentic selves. This can
happen regardless of how common-place any manner of speaking or turn of
phrase is or may have been for its time. In fact, an alarming variety of
inclusivity bugs stem from language we all commonly use.

Readers might dismiss Armstrong's specific words as merely a figure of
speech or a sign of the times. \emph{That's just the way we spoke then.
Armstrong didn't intend to exclude women.} Or, readers might think that
the problem is the English language because it does not easily avail
itself to gender neutrality. But, that would be wrong. While English is
notoriously lacking in gender-neutral pronouns, it is otherwise one of
the most accommodating languages for gender neutrality.

As HPC/CSE software developers maybe we're not doing anything nearly as
momentous as being the first Earthlings to walk on another planet. Do we
really need to worry so much about inclusive language? If we care about
our project's reach and maximizing our ability to attract and retain
collaborators, developers, users or sponsors, then yes we do. That is
because the language we use has the power to welcome others in as well
as push them away.

Software projects involve a lot of communication. As developers, we
write code, comments, documentation, research papers, presentations, job
postings, promotional materials, discussion posts, emails, chats, tweets
and more. It is now well known that language used in job
postings\textsuperscript{6} has the effect of biasing the respondent
pool. The more we adopt inclusive language, the more we reduce biases
and create welcoming and safe spaces for all participants to be their
authentic selves, to be productive and to thrive.

Any readers who have written proposals likely already appreciate the
role language plays when communicating our work. When writing proposals,
we often struggle with and debate at length how individual word choices
will align our proposal with the sponsor's call. In other words, we all
already appreciate the importance of and can be quite mindful of the
impact of language on funding. Being mindful of the impact of language
on inclusion is no different.

Inclusive~\emph{naming} is closely related to inclusive language but
focuses primarily on the naming of things. That is the~\emph{names} we
choose for abstract objects of our software systems.~There is probably
no other human activity that involves the naming of new things as much
as software development. There is power in naming and with great power,
comes great responsibility. The names we use in our code and its
associated artifacts (PR reviews, documentation, presentations, social
media posts, etc.) are often shaped by our culture.

A special challenge with inclusive~\emph{naming} is that people tend to
get pretty attached to names. Was Edmund Halley the first to observe and
record the comet\textsuperscript{7} that bears his
name?\textsuperscript{8} Chinese astronomers observed and
recorded\textsuperscript{9} it almost 2,000 years earlier! Was
Pythagoras the first person\textsuperscript{10} ever to discover and
write down the rule we know as the Pythagorean theorem? Plenty of
scholarly research\textsuperscript{11} says others developed it earlier.

For many terms and phrases in common use, we are simply unwittingly
parroting others. That can be problematic when one is not mindful of the
meaning, history or impact of a term. For example, are readers fully
aware of why we call defects in
software~\emph{bugs}?\textsuperscript{12} How might women feel reading
documentation that constantly refers to the user
as~\emph{he},~\emph{his} or~\emph{him}?\textsuperscript{13} How might
Black people feel reading that existing users will
be~\emph{grandfathered in}\textsuperscript{14} when the software license
terms are changed? How might neurodiverse people feel about being tasked
to add~\emph{sanity checks}\textsuperscript{15} to a software package's
test suite?

By the way, do readers recognize any bias in the preceding questions?
It's subtle but worth mentioning. The way these questions are worded
assume that only women would care about documentation that is laden with
male pronouns or that only Black people would care about language
derived out of racially oppressive practices or that only neurodiverse
people would care about language associated with atypical patterns of
thought or behavior. The truth is, we all (should ) care. And, to use
language that assumes or suggests otherwise is, well, not inclusive.

No way to phrase something will be acceptable to literally~\emph{every}
individual. And, there is no reason we should be aiming for that either.
Catering to any~\emph{one} individual's tastes and sensibilities is not
what inclusive language is all about. The goal of inclusive language is
to reduce the use of terms and phrases that discourage \emph{whole
groups of people} from participating as their full authentic selves. It
is not about being politically correct or being the language police. It
is not about avoiding offending\textsuperscript{16} people either. It's
about being willing to acknowledge that certain terms and phrases (and,
honestly, even names, icons and logos), however common in current
culture, can be unnecessarily exclusive and being willing to consider
and adopt alternatives that are less so.

If you've read this far, you may be asking yourself, how do I get
started? We suggest reading some of the resources available from other
major organizations such as the federal government's~\emph{Plain
Language}\textsuperscript{17}, Google's~\emph{Inclusive
Style}\textsuperscript{18} or Microsoft's~\emph{Bias Free
Communication.}\textsuperscript{19}~Be aware that some resources and
efforts are focused more upon identifying specific words and phrases to
be fixed whereas others are focused more on principles of inclusive
language. In particular, if you are looking for~\emph{tooling} to help
alert you to inclusive language issues, some resources provide tooling
as a web service. That said, community standards and DevOps-hardened
tooling for inclusive language similar to spelling or grammar checkers
is still in its infancy stages.

Ever since adopting the practice myself, not a week goes by that I don't
have the experience of questioning a term or phrase I am about to use. I
often spend a few minutes searching the web to learn more about it. This
includes terms and phrases I have used many times before without really
thinking about it such as describing an off-topic enhancement request as
having gone~\emph{off the reservation},\textsuperscript{20} or replying
to it with~\emph{no can do},\textsuperscript{21} or introducing a
colleague as a Python~\emph{Guru}\textsuperscript{22} or a
Java~\emph{Ninja},\textsuperscript{22} or complaining my bug reports
are~\emph{falling on deaf ears},\textsuperscript{24} or that the level
of effort is too many~\emph{man-hours}.\textsuperscript{25}

Many on-line resources may be useful to readers who would be similarly
inclined. But, beware. In seeking greater understanding of the history
of terms and phrases you thought you knew, you find a lot of
misinformation\textsuperscript{26} out there to sift through. In
addition, when you are seeking to learn more about any possible negative
impacts of a given word or phrase, it's best to seek opinions from
experts~\emph{within} the groups most likely impacted. In other words,
if a given phrase has potential negative impacts against Blacks, then
language experts within the Black community will likely have the the
most authoritative guidance. If a given phrase has potential negative
impacts against the deaf, then language experts within the deaf
community will likely have the most informed guidance.

Finally, in seeking to fix inclusivity bugs, it's important to take care
that we don't introduce another kind of problem\ldots{}excluding the use
of perfectly acceptable language for no other reason than out of fear of
looking bad or being labeled non-inclusive. A good example is the
word~\emph{master}\textsuperscript{27} alone, wholly apart from
\emph{slave} . Hopefully, we all can agree
that~\emph{master/slave}\textsuperscript{28} language is not acceptable.

But, there is much less agreement, notably even within the Black
community, about the word~\emph{master} alone and with no relation
to~\emph{slave} . Many uses of~\emph{master} have no historical roots in
oppressive or genocidal systems. These include such terms
as~\emph{mastermind},~\emph{postmaster},~\emph{master key},~\emph{master
recording}, achieving~\emph{mastery} of a skill and even common tech
terms like~\emph{webmaster} and~\emph{scrum master}. This issue garnered
much attention when GitHub announced\textsuperscript{29} it would change
its~\emph{default} branch name (which most users simply adopt without
question) from~\emph{master} to~\emph{main}. In that move it is worth
pointing out that the~\emph{default} language of a widely used resource
such as git is a significantly greater proliferation potential and
represents a qualitatively different situation than the choices
individual projects make. Furthermore, in GitHub's move no project was
prevented from using~\emph{master} as a git branch name if they chose.

Given the current social justice climate in which we all operate, some
readers will feel that inclusive language efforts are nowhere near
enough to meet the moment and are really just a
distraction\textsuperscript{28} from bigger issues. It's hard to argue
with that. Nonetheless, others will feel like such efforts go way too
far. While we can acknowledge both perspectives exist, it is worth
considering that when we're accustomed to parroting the status quo,
pausing to be more inclusive may feel like
oppression.\textsuperscript{30}

\par\null

\textbf{Mark C. Miller} is a computer scientist supporting the Weapon
Simulation and Computing~ (WSC) program at Lawrence Livermore National
Laboratory for more than 30 years. He has recently developed a passion
for addressing issues at the nexus of computing and inclusion. Among
other things, Mark contributes
to~\href{https://wci.llnl.gov/simulation/computer-codes/visit}{VisIt},~\href{https://wci.llnl.gov/simulation/computer-codes/silo}{Silo},~\href{https://www.hdfgroup.org/}{HDF5}
and~\href{https://ideas-productivity.org/ideas-ecp/}{IDEAS-ECP}. Contact
him at~\href{mailto:miller86@llnl.gov}{\nolinkurl{miller86@llnl.gov}}.

\par\null

\section*{Footnotes}

{\label{151922}}

\textsuperscript{1}\url{https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/telephone-conversation-with-the-apollo-11-astronauts-the-moon}

\textsuperscript{2}\url{https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo\_11\_in\_popular\_culture\#:~:text=The\%20mission\%20was\%20extensively\%20covered,worldwide\%20watched\%20the\%20Moon\%20landing}

\textsuperscript{3}\url{https://www.gesmer.com/team/joanna-lee/}

\textsuperscript{4}\url{https://inclusivenaming.org/}

\textsuperscript{5}\url{http://www.inclusiveprism.org/}

\textsuperscript{6}\url{https://www.mya.com/blog/unconscious-bias-in-job-descriptions/}

\textsuperscript{7}\url{https://www.space.com/19878-halleys-comet.html}

\textsuperscript{8}The comet is named for Halley not because he saw or
recorded it first but because he is believed to be the first person to
have~estimated its orbit and based on that connected recorded
observations from 1531, 1607 and 1682 as being the same celestial object
from which he correctly predicted its return in 1758. That said, apart
from the very significant achievement of the comet's orbital estimation,
it isn't clear if astronomers much earlier than Halley had recognized
this repeat visitor as the same celestial object.

\textsuperscript{9}\href{https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historical_comet_observations_in_China\#Halley\%E2\%80\%99s_Comet}{https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historical\_comet\_observations\_in\_China\#Halley's\_Comet}

\textsuperscript{10}\url{https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pythagoras\#In\_mathematics}

\textsuperscript{11}\url{https://www.researchgate.net/publication/337941217\_Mathematics\_in\_Ancient\_Egypt\_Part\_II}

\textsuperscript{12}\url{https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software\_bug\#History}

\textsuperscript{13}\url{https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2019/12/15/guide-how-gender-neutral-language-is-developing-around-world/}

\textsuperscript{14}\url{https://www.npr.org/sections/codeswitch/2013/10/21/239081586/the-racial-history-of-the-grandfather-clause}

\textsuperscript{15}\url{https://gist.github.com/seanmhanson/fe370c2d8bd2b3228680e38899baf5cc}

\textsuperscript{16}\url{https://theconversation.com/why-people-take-offence-131736}

\textsuperscript{17}\url{https://www.plainlanguage.gov/}

\textsuperscript{18}\url{https://developers.google.com/style/inclusive-documentation}

\textsuperscript{19}\url{https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/style-guide/bias-free-communication}

\textsuperscript{20}\url{https://www.npr.org/sections/codeswitch/2014/06/29/326690947/should-saying-someone-is-off-the-reservation-be-off-limits}

\textsuperscript{21}\url{https://mentalfloss.com/article/625916/racist-origins-common-phrases}

\textsuperscript{22}\url{https://www.yogajournal.com/lifestyle/cultural-appropriation/}

\textsuperscript{24}\url{https://www.hearinglikeme.com/is-the-phrase-falling-on-deaf-ears-offensive/}

\textsuperscript{25}\url{https://bossbetty.com/big-story/manpower-man-hours-and-other-phrases-to-ix-nay-from-your-iased-bay-vocabulary/}

\textsuperscript{26}\url{https://www.nytimes.com/1998/01/25/magazine/on-language-misrule-of-thumb.html}

\textsuperscript{27}\url{https://www.etymonline.com/word/master}

\textsuperscript{28}\url{https://www.wired.com/story/tech-confronts-use-labels-master-slave/}

\textsuperscript{29}\url{https://www.vice.com/en/article/k7qbyv/github-to-remove-masterslave-terminology-from-its-platform}

\textsuperscript{30}\url{https://www.huffpost.com/entry/when-youre-accustomed-to-privilege\_b\_9460662}

\par\null\par\null

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