"gyp" is a racial slur

The word "gyp" means "to cheat or swindle". It's a shortened version of "gypsy" a slur for Roma people who are commonly maligned as cheaters and swindlers.

Some references:

• https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/gyp
• https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=gyp
• https://www.npr.org/sections/codeswitch/2013/12/30/242429836/why-being-gypped-hurts-the-roma-more-than-it-hurts-you

[v4dkou]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GYP_(software)

[HDVinnie]

The word "gyp" means "to cheat or swindle". It's a shortened version of "gypsy" a slur for Roma people who are commonly maligned as cheaters and swindlers.

Some references:

• https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/gyp
• https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=gyp
• https://www.npr.org/sections/codeswitch/2013/12/30/242429836/why-being-gypped-hurts-the-roma-more-than-it-hurts-you

Get a life

[erbridge]

Just because it's an acronym, doesn't make what the acronym spells ok. Until today, I had no idea it even was an acronym. This isn't the first time this sort of thing has come up. See the current discussions around master in Git and the recent ones about GIMP that resulted in the Glimpse fork.

[v4dkou]

@erbridge There's undoubtedly a trend, this recent one about allopenissues also comes to mind.
https://jira.atlassian.com/browse/JRASERVER-65811

For the record, in that case the decision was ruled against the change. Despite the fact that there's ample references to the possible interpretations of the word and them not being gender-neutral, there was no consensus that while somebody might take offence in that, the technical term is in fact offensive by itself.

If you feel that there's a need for change, I think it'd be beneficial for the community as a whole to provide more context to show how this node-gyp issue differs from allopenissues.

[mmarchini]

Sharing some context: gyp was created by Google many years ago to be the Chromium build system. Node.js adopted it as building V8 (which is part of both Node.js and Chromium) with it was a lot easier than writing and porting every change to make or other build system. Google deprecated it and replaced it with GN in 2016, but Node.js didn't move to GN as the effort is too big and general consensus is to move to CMake in the future (which is also a huge effort). Recently a fork of gyp was created to apply any patches Node.js might need until the efforts to move to CMake are finished. node-gyp is a wrapper around that build system, which is why it is named that way (although arguably the name is not so meaningful and can be confusing for folks who are not familiar with gyp as a build system).

Changing the name without a strategy is not feasible as it would likely cause a disruption in the ecosystem, breaking many packages. Also, changing the name of this project alone wouldn't be of much use, as gyp-next would still have the name, and so would other projects like node-pre-gyp, not to mention one of the extensions used by the build system is .gyp. So any changes in name here would be a much bigger effort, and someone would need to volunteer to lead it.

One plus side (technically speaking) of changing the name IMO is that we could choose a package name that is build system agnostic, and it could be used as a front-end package to make migration between build systems easier.

Reopening as I believe this is worth at least discussing. But just as recent discussions around the master name as default git branch, this will need a technical strategy to migrate without ecosystem disruption before any decision is made. Also, maybe it makes sense to move this to nodejs/gyp-next, since, as I mentioned before, any changes would not be limited to this project alone.

cc @nodejs/community-committee as it might be of your interest

[v4dkou]

For completeness sake, here are some other potentially offensive build system names.

Rake

https://github.com/ruby/rake

Rake (top definition)
A long-handled gardening tool that can also mean an immoral pleasure seeker.

https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Rake

Buck

https://github.com/facebook/buck

Buck (2nd definition)
3.n: slang for a young black man
4.n: a male deer

https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=buck

These projects should probably have same problems regarding renaming the tool (disruption in the ecosystem, breaking many packages, existing CI/CD environments, etc.)., so when evaluating cost vs. benefit, I would discuss it with these communities as well.

Feel free to open an issue in corresponding repositories for Rake and Buck.

[NarutoSage]

Honestly they shouldn't have to change the name of the project, its been that way for quite some time just because it by the imagination resembles something somewhat of a slur if you connect distant dots, doesn't mean it should be changed and if you had to connect those dots to make a concern about something thats never been both the philosophy of the name of the project is completely stupid, and you should spend more time trying to make rockets at that point.

[jesseduffield]

This is obviously going to be an emotionally charged thread so from the get-go, I hope a healthy discussion takes place.

Reading through this grammarphobia post it seems that the status of Gypsy as a slur against the Romani is disputed, even within Romani culture (emphasis mine):

Some people who identify themselves as ethnically Roma (also called Romani or Romany) are offended by “Gypsy,” and most standard dictionaries have reservations about using it to mean Roma. On the other hand, some Roma people don’t mind being called “Gypsies” and others even embrace the term.

This story from 2016 uses the term Gypsy liberally, as does one of the subjects of the piece who says:

I've always been incredibly proud of my Gypsy heritage

Consider this story from this year titled ‘I’m A Gypsy – I Want My Grandchildren To Be Proud Of That Fact’. The subject of that piece who works for Gypsy and Traveller Empowerment (GATE) Essex explicitly says:

I am a Gypsy challenging inequalities and prejudice to my people in any way that I can.

If that’s politically campaigning with a board in Parliament Square, online or through mentoring – however I can help my community.

I say ‘Gypsy’ because there’s a lot of beliefs that that word isn’t liked by us anymore – it is.

The fact that the Gypsy and Traveller Empowerment organisation, an advocacy group for the Romani, uses that word in their title, as does the Gypsy Lore Society tells me that the time has not yet come to cancel the term.

If node-gyp mentioned the Romani in the readme alongside a stereotypical Gypsy as a mascot, thus implying equivalence, we would definitely have a problem. If no mention of the Romani was made, we would have less of a problem but eyebrows might understandably be raised at the mascot. What the repo in fact has is no mascot, no mention of the Romani, and the only reason that 'gyp' appears in the name is because it's an acronym for Generate Your Projects. I think that the case for a rename will be far stronger after Gypsy and Traveller Empowerment and the Gypsy Lore Society change their own names.

But I'm not an expert so I'm happy to be swayed otherwise :)

[Mooninaut]

@jesseduffield "Gypsy" is arguably not a slur. "Gyp" is widely considered a slur, so your (well cited) discussion of whether the term "Gypsy" is offensive in an of itself is not particularly relevant to this issue. See https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/law-and-order/5483053/Judge-accused-of-using-racial-slur-against-gypsies.html for example. The name of this project is not "node-gypsy", it's "node-gyp".

[dball]

Just going to observe that every time I see this name show up in a build failure, it makes me think less of everyone involved. Ignorance is one thing; knowing harm is another.

[ussjoin]

I opened a PR to fix this issue (#2211) and @rvagg closed it as a duplicate, which makes no sense. Could someone please explain how a PR with passing tests dupes an issue?