Suggestion to rename the project

[ryanflorence]

I'm okay with a solid pun in conversation but its really hard to suggest using testacular in many, many settings.

Or at least stick to the (spec|test)acular combined word in marketing and quit talking about "balls".

[kivikakk]

@12eebok this one is evident, intentional, and uh, yeah, I don't want to be reminded of sex organs when coding, thanks. It may not make you feel uncomfortable, but clearly plenty of others do. That's somehow not enough?

[vendethiel]

please leave that as is, thanks. no need to drama here. the issue is opened.

[trepidatio]

Testacular is a damn creepy name. If it's intended to be funny, it's falling pretty far short of that.

@Nami-Doc That doesn't make sense.

[vendethiel]

what does not ?

[dcaliri]

@reinh "but @dcaliri has made it clear that it was his intent to give the project a sexist name. That's what I'm talking about now." you may be a little mistaken. Let me clear something:

1)- I'm NOT related to this project nor sometime in the past and therefore I had no intention of giving a name or whatever. 2)- My only intention was to vote against renaming the project and my argument is really simple and you or anyone can either agree or disagree, that's the beauty of discussions. 3)- My argument is: I don't think we should even use energies in making such changes when there is plenty of work to do. If you think the library is nice and gives you a value, then use it. If you think you can make it better, then go for it also BUT don't waste your time with this kinds of discussions. This piece of code could be used by africans, asians, and lots of other persons that may have a different culture, may speak a different language and therefore may be or not "offended (?)" by another name you may pick up to replace the actual one as well. I'm not american, and my native language is not english and I found the name really cool. I even had to go to urban dictionary to understand the whole issue, and after doing that, and reading I just only reinforce my initial opinion. What's the point? Is it worth this whole thing? We have a really nice work that's giving us a lot of value. Enough. Let's use our energy elsewhere and lets move down our shields. This is not a fight. No one is trying to offend anyone with this great work.

[nozpheratu]

@unnali It may, or may not have been intentional in the past. But looking at the new homepage I see the tagline:

Spectacular Test Runner for JavaScript

Evidently, it's meant to be a compound word now. If the name still bothers you I suggest forking the repository and renaming it.

@Nami-Doc What drama are you referring to exactly? I'm voicing my opinion as to why I don't think this repo should be renamed. Also, currently the issue is closed as far as I can tell.

[yorickpeterse]

Small disclaimer: I have never used this project and/or Ember, and probably never will for reasons that are out of the scope of this discussion. I do care for the underlying issue discussed here so lets get started.

The core problem of this name is not that it's offensive (more on this later) or even that sexist (hold your horses and bear with me for a minute). It's suggestive and alienating instead, the latter in turn makes it somewhat sexist. Of course there's worse, remember that Geeklist video of a while ago? Having said that I'm Dutch guy and as such I'm a bit more used to somewhat vulgar words/meanings, after all we're more or less the kings of swearing.

This doesn't mean I support it though, I'm actually against using suggestive names like these. Not because they are super duper offensive but simply because they are suggestive. I would equally frown if I had to install something called "libfreudianslip" or "rack-nipple". Again not because it's offensive, but simply because it's really, really out of place.

Which leads me to a common statement said by people during these discussions: "Don't be offended!" or "Lighten up!" or even better: "NO DRAMA PLZ!!!". Nothing personal, but more often than not these statements are the result of completely missing the point. This doesn't instantly means the person is a bad person, it just means they aren't well informed about things. Now of course there are people who do actually get offended but those are usually pretty easy to spot BECAUSE THEY'LL USE CAPITALS AND DON'T MAKE A LOT OF SENSE BECAUSE EMOTIONS MAKE IT HARD TO THINK!!11.

Now lets take a closer look at what's actually wrong with the name. According to Urban Dictionary it means the following:

Testacular

a word a man may use to describe something both truly spectacular and manly; the word is a combination of spectacular and testicles.

In other words, it's a bad pun based on the combination of testicles and spectacular combined with a reference to how "manly" something is (it being Javascript I think we can all agree it's anything but manly, /me runs). Reasons why people possibly dislike the name:

• It has a reference to testicles in it
• It assumes it somehow follows the image of manliness, one I think we can all agree upon is heavily twisted (the same goes with feminine by the way).
• It also implies only a "man" tends to use it, though this is up for debate

In case I haven't made myself clear yet, it's not about being offensive, it's about the name not fitting the programming ecosystem maybe with the exception of that one overly sexist startup in San Francisco or god knows where it was (can't remember the name either).

The various counter arguments raised so far can basically be summed up as the following:

• I'm missing the point, please not discuss this
• I'm missing the point, therefor you are causing similar problems

Now I can see that it might be more productive to write code instead of sitting around the table for an hour to come up with a good name (believe it or not but proper names are hard). However, it's very, very wrong to simply bury your head in the sand every time an issue like this comes up. Instead one should learn from it, admit they made a mistake and move on. This is the core of programming whether you actually realize it or not: you make mistakes, learn from them and then become a better person (at least that's the idea).

The second counter argument is generally a result of people simply not really knowing what to say. The classic "no u!" is a perfect example of this. Instead of actually trying to think of what's being discussed one flips the argument around and aims it the other person.

Moral of the story: the name is not offensive (at least from my perspective), it's not that sexist either. It's alienating because of the reasons mentioned above, it's also quite simply a stupid pun.

p.s. As I'm writing this it's 00:15 and I'm getting a bit tired. Between entertaining my cat and writing this I probably lost track somewhere of my little story. Hopefully I'm making at least some sense.

[vendethiel]

NO DRAMA PLZ!!!

now look at me, back at my comment, now back at me, now back at my comment ... More sense reading the whole message? ;)

[yorickpeterse]

@Nami-Doc Actually I have, and that's part of the problem. Now I have no idea how old you are but when I was a little bit younger (lets say, 14) I used to do something similar. Every time some kind of issue came up, be it code related (which was rare since I hardly wrote any at the time) or something else I'd try to playfully work my way around the problem instead of accepting and resolving it.

Lets take a closer look at your comments thus far. You start by showing some supposedly "funny" picture along with linking to a rather pathetic GitHub issue. Maybe this is just me but to me this in itself shows that you really don't belong in the programming community (at least not the mature part of it).

Your second comment is about how people supposedly have no sense of humor, implying that the name of this project is actually funny and that people shouldn't make a fuzz about it. In other words, you're telling people to bury their head in the sand.

Your third comment is a link to Horse JS which, although quite a funny Twitter account, is a bit out of place. Not because it's unrelated to what's going on but because you're again trying to work around the problem by making people laugh (I think?).

Your fourth (and following, because I'm lazy) comment(s) are about how supposedly an avatar is out of place. Again this comes down to what I mentioned above: flipping the argument around hoping you're actually gaining something out of it.

now look at me, back at my comment, now back at me, now back at my comment ... More sense reading the whole message? ;)

So to answer your question: yes it actually does, because it confirms that what I was saying is actually the case and that you (and others) are missing the point.

[vendethiel]

Ok, so let's resume my points 1) I agree the issue exists, I just don't think we need around thirty people repeating that over and over 2) While I agree with the main argument does not mean I agree with all little things people said, hence my second, or third maybe. Was it the fourth? 3) I do link funny things when I think there's a need to relax to continue discussing - people hating on each other's argument is not going to change anything. In that case, I prefer to play the "childish" (is that it?) 4) my age does not matter. For as long I remember (and I stumble sometimes on post I made when I was 14) on the internet, I've been acting like that (but I had a poor english back then). 5) Indeed, funny pictures on the internet do make me gain something

TL;DR, it's an issue, I don't think it's related to sexism (it's just misplaced), and I can use a bit of humor to change the tension in the room if I feel the need too. We're not here to work around the issue. We can not. We're here to acknowledge it, and I think it's acknowledged now.

[n0x00]

I think 'VirginiaBalls' would settle this.

[rexmortus]

What about a dual name like Testacular/Breastacular so both genders are evenly represented

[kotp]

I think that the conversation is ridiculous. I mean, working in a safety field, do you think I would get sued for telling a woman to make sure she has her strap on? When people act immaturely and giggle and snicker about things because it is their mind that is twisting things, they should be given the chance to get some help.

I mean, really? Maybe that person is spectacular, because his pecs are really awesome. Oh, we should change the word spectacular to fantastic because it has the word 'pec' in there which may refer to his chest. But then we can't use fantastic, because it could be referring to someones awesome fanny. Where does this end, and some sort of mature creativity begin?

We are not 8 or 10 people.

[vojtajina]

First, when we named the project (@mhevery came up with this cool name), I even did not know the word "testicular", as I'm not a native speaker and I only know words that I need/use ;-)

Since the beginning, it was meant to be Testing + Spectacular (Spectacular Test Runner or Testing Done Spectacular, etc).

The subtitle from the out-dated video was stupid and it was on only for several days. It seemed funny to me at that time, but I realized that it could harm some people and therefore I removed it.

I just went through first couple of pages of search results for "testacular" and all the results are relevant.

I'd like to point out, that I work on this project in my free time. I'm not forcing anyone to use it. I'm not making any money on it. I do it, because it's helping us to be more productive and it's hopefully helping other people as well. That makes me feel good. If anybody decides not to use it because of the name, I'm fine with it.

I'm gonna spend my time improving things, rather than renaming projects or reading these discussions.

Honestly, this discussion makes me feel sad.

[dcaliri]

Happy to see you are in the. "Let's work and stop nonsense issues" side. Thanks for the good work btw El mar 5, 2013 8:57 AM, "Vojta Jina" notifications@github.com escribió:

First, when we named the project (@mhevery https://github.com/mheverycame up with this cool name), I even did not know the word "testicular", as I'm not a native speaker and I only know words that I need/use ;-)

Since the beginning, it was meant to be Testing + Spectacular (Spectacular Test Runner or Testing Done Spectacular, etc).

The subtitle from the out-dated video was stupid and it was on only for several days. It seemed funny to me at that time, but I realized that it could harm some people and therefore I removed it.

I just went through first couple of pages of search results for "testacular" and all the results are relevant.

I'd like to point out, that I work on this project in my free time. I'm not forcing anyone to use it. I'm not making any money on it. I do it, because it's helping us to be more productive and it's hopefully helping other people as well. That makes me feel good. If anybody decides not to use it because of the name, I'm fine with it.

I'm gonna spend my time improving things, rather than renaming projects or reading these discussions.

Honestly, this discussion makes me feel sad.

— Reply to this email directly or view it on GitHubhttps://github.com/testacular/testacular/issues/376#issuecomment-14436355 .

[searls]

@vojtajina So Google isn't paying for any of the development time on the project? What's the relationship of this project and Angular & Google?

[nozpheratu]

Since the beginning, it was meant to be Testing + Spectacular (Spectacular Test Runner or Testing Done Spectacular, etc).

Misunderstanding resolved. Get on with your lives people.

[IgorMinar]

+1 to what @vojtajina said. I was there when the name was conceived and it was always meant to be Test-acular as in Spec-tacular testing tool.

[jeremysmitherman]

While you guys are at it, can we rename Git as well? I feel it's exclusionary to people with low intelligence

[davemo]

[ryanflorence]

@jeremysmitherman No, I didn't; that was in response to @dcaliri assertion that a project's name is irrelevant, only its utility, which is obviously false when you put a truly offensive word in the mix.

If you read my posts I am not on a mission to rid the internet of offense. I'm simply making a marketing suggestion, that's it. I want to use testacular, but given the context (which is everything) that it will be discussed with co-workers and clients, its inappropriate and distracting.

I am done with this thread, testem is serving me just fine :)

[thomascampbelladams]

I'm a little perturbed that people really think they should stick with this name.

It looks like an awesome tool, but the name makes me want to choose something else as a testing platform just to avoid embarrassment in the office.

I can understand having a bit of humor, but if this tool is meant to be used professionally, then it needs a professional name.

[dcaliri]

It's simpler than it seems. Try to understand that we live in a globalized world. There's more than the U.S or Europe, and there's more than english. You may change the name and later realize that it could be embarrasing for some Madagascar's tribe or town or whatever. It's a tool, and it's generated value is what matters. If you dislike the name for whatever reason, then fork it, rename it and keep moving foward.

[jeremysmitherman]

"It looks like an awesome tool, but the name makes me want to choose something else as a testing platform just to avoid embarrassment in the office."

Sounds like your office kinda sucks. If people are making the jump to balls from testacular in spoken speech they may be repressing some issues from childhood.

[envygeeks]

Yup, this is the internet, pseudo-psychology will out.

[ayust]

Just a proof of concept, I have no desire to maintain a fork myself: ayust/spectacular

Took about 5-10 minutes and a few find+sed commands.

[vojtajina]

OK. So, we took some time to think about it and we're going to rename the project. 70+ comments in 2 days is some kind of new record for a testacular bug. It says something important that so many people had an opinion.

What we really have an opinion about is testing and making things simple. The new project name is "karma", as in the idea of destiny following as effect from cause. We think testing is the ultimate virtuous action and we want to get back to focusing on building a spectacularly fast test runner so that you can write more well-tested code to get your own favorable results.

We know this is going to affect your projects. We'll work out a migration plan and announce it before changing everything over, and make sure the transition is as easy as possible.

[dcaliri]

Really sad to read this. Let's hope no one comes telling us 'karma' may offend him/her... there are so many cultures and languages in this world...

[miloops]

[yorickpeterse]

@vojtajina :+1: It's good to see you are willing to consider these changes, especially since they may not be as easy from a technical perspective. There will always be people that disagree but based on the comments above I think that those (in this particular case) weren't going to do anything useful anyway.

[nozpheratu]

I wonder how many people above suggestion a name change actually use this tool. Personally I have zero-stake whatsoever, I just heard a re-tweet from somebody. Now that I look at this issue a little more closely there's a few other names I recognize from Twitter. Take @thomascampbelladams for instance, he opened up an account yesterday only to get his say on this issue. I'll bet money he wouldn't use the tool regardless of the name.

[dcaliri]

@YorickPeterse You have just spoken truth "There will always be people that disagree" ...as the ones that disagreed in first place. We can go on forever and ever, wasting time and effort of course. Using the "those weren't going to do anything useful anyway" argument looks really absurd to me. The only proof here is some useful tool. The rest is irrelevant and we are wasting time on this.

[LindseyB]

@vojtajina thank you :+1:

[tanepiper]

When did we become such humourless PC prudes? I don't see any of you complaining over MongoDB's name

[LindseyB]

@tanepiper

I was reading a book (about interjections, oddly enough) yesterday which included the phrase “In these days of political correctness…” talking about no longer making jokes that denigrated people for their culture or for the colour of their skin. And I thought, “That’s not actually anything to do with ‘political correctness’. That’s just treating other people with respect.” Which made me oddly happy. I started imagining a world in which we replaced the phrase “politically correct” wherever we could with “treating other people with respect”, and it made me smile. You should try it. It’s peculiarly enlightening. I know what you’re thinking now. You’re thinking “Oh my god, that’s treating other people with respect gone mad!”

-- Neil Gaiman (source)

[ayust]

@LindseyB :+1:

[yorickpeterse]

@dcaliri I recommend you to give my previous comment a good read and think about it because as I've mentioned you're missing the point. People don't want the name changed for the sake of changing it but because it's alienating and a really bad and male specific pun (which leads to the former issue).

Saying people should just ignore these issues is probably even worse than these issues arising in the first place. It shows that people are ignorant to the underlying problem and prefer to just hide instead of solving it.

[dcaliri]

@YorickPeterse the name is alienating TO YOU, or to YOUR CULTURE or IN YOUR LANGUAGE , and you may rename it only to move the alienation elsewhere. That's my argument. The only way is just stop being such sensitive. The ones that wrote this made it because it makes work easier or increases productivity or whatever with value, not because they are trying to offend or something.

[yorickpeterse]

So basically what you're saying is that because a specific group of people but not everybody finds it alienating it should be ignored all together?

Should we have ignored the problem of black people being discriminated during the 1900s because they were a minority as well? Maybe we should have been less sensitive! That certainly would've solved the issue right...right? To take a more recent example: equal treatment of homo and heterosexuals. Should we just ignore the issue because we're being "too sensitive" or actually stand up and do something about it?

Your comments just further prove my point. You fail to understand the issue and consider it not worth discussing because you personally are ok with it. If you were the only person using this tool (or another one for that matter) then that would be fine.

However, this is not the case. Many people are using this tool (at least by the looks of it) and quite a few have voiced their opinion on the name. The author was enough of a man to accept the problem and solve it (at least we hope). I can only hope one day you too realize what the issue is about.

With that said I'll be withdrawing from this discussion as I feel that I am unable to explain the issue properly to the remaining few that are against changing the name and are so vocal about it.

[dcaliri]

No man... I say that you find a group that finds it alienating, then you change it, then another group finds the new name alienating (because there's more than US, Europe and english), then we change the name again, then another group finds it alienating, then we change again, then....

do you get the point?

It's easier to take things as they are. This is a piece of code. Use it or not and stop creating issues over this kinds of things...

[yozlet]

@dcaliri "then another group finds the new name alienating"... who, exactly? Once there are actual complaints about the new name, you might have a point. In the meantime, please read: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slippery_slope#Fallacy

In the meantime, another :thumbsup:

[dcaliri]

LOL, who? we don't know yet, or did the ones that picked up the 1st name knew that Mr X or the group Y was going to find it alienating? I have a point, you are all just too selfish and think that anything MAY be a sort of attack or offense instead of saying "Dude, what a great job you've done. I'm loving it" and using it happily.

[dcaliri]

I repeat... there's a susceptibility overflow all over the place

[reinh]

@dcaliri I think it's incredible that you are actually suggesting that we prioritize possible future harm to an unspecified group over actual present harm to a real oppressed group that is currently and historically the victim of widespread institutionalized sexism of exactly this nature. Whatever the factual basis of Ryan's original claim, the problem we're discussing now is also the insensitivity and marginalization you and others have shown towards the feelings and beliefs your fellow developers.

Since the beginning of this dialog, I have found your contributions to be irrational at best and actually offensive at worst, and I don't think I'm alone in this. I would once again sincerely urge you to consider how your behavior is affecting those around you. A little empathy in this situation would go a long way.

@vojtajina I think you've made the correct choice. Despite your intentions, which I do not doubt were good, the reality of the situation is that the name you chose has had a negative influence on the perception of the project and people's willingness to become involved. It's wise to get out from under that baggage and give yourselves a fresh start so that we can all focus on what -- as you say -- really matters: building an awesome tool that everyone can use.

[jeremysmitherman]

Oh god this is so great. http://www.reactiongifs.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/05/tumblr_ljh0puClWT1qfkt17.gif

[ayust]

http://therealkatie.net/blog/2012/mar/21/lighten-up/

[dcaliri]

harm? seriously?

Yeah....definately, there's a team that made some HUGE work that gives a freaking awesome value, but WAIT, there's something... a name, that in some kind of twisted minds cause (or MAY cause) a real HARM to a real oppressed group....

Man.... are you serious? we should change attitudes here, and I'd like to read or listen to a specific case of someone that really actually felt harmed. I sincerely would like to listen to him/her. Meanwhile let's keep wasting efforts on victimizing us or whoever :+1:

[jayzeng]

Gosh. I actually love the name testacular, but I am cool with whatever name as long as it remains to be an awesome library.

[kivikakk]

@vojtajina I'm incredibly heart-warmed to hear that you care. For what it's worth, I think karma is a great name, and I hope that you find this move brings you some positive karma in the OSS world too.

Just in time for International Women's Day!

[kivikakk]

@dcaliri The work is huge, and indeed awesome! And no-one in this thread is doubting that.

But women have been systematically oppressed for more-or-less all time, and it's little acts like these that continue to remind us that we don't belong in software development. Most just won't bother, because it's just one long up-hill battle, and yet that's ~50% of your potential co-contributors, ~50% potential incredible ideas, ~50% leaders of amazing software that you're happy to continue to sideline.

It just doesn't make sense. The idea that "the merit is entirely in the code (and not in the name)" falls down because there's inequality from the start: women already have it hard enough to enter this space and be recognised as equal, and persistent reminders that we're not welcome, or not the "target" audience (which a name like "testacular" falls into) only serve to reinforce this.