Post #1811130

2026-04-23 08:11 UTC

non-inclusive term: white-hat Uh, sorry to comment besides the subject, but could someone explain why white-hat is non-inclusive? I’m not trying to argue it is not, but I had not heard that and I can’t find any answers by searching about it

Replies (1)

@JasonDJ@lemmy.zip 2026-04-23 14:43

There's been a push in IT (and I assume other industries as well) towards inclusive-language. Part of that is moving away from phrasing that has non-technical historical connotations...like using "leader/follower" or "primary/secondary" instead of "master/slave". But another part is also getting away from catagorizing things as good/bad on a white/black spectrum. We no longer blacklist things, we denylist or blocklist them. Likewise we no longer whitelist things...they get allowlisted or permitlisted. We don't have white-hat/black-hat hackers...we have defensive/offensive, or blue-team/red-team. Afaik it's still okay to refer to plugs and prongs as female and male, as that is referring to biological sex moreso than gender. But yet, people gasp when I refer to plugs that have a sheath over them as "uncircumcised".

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