GNU bug report logs - #61325
30.0.50; Jokes in GNUS manual

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Message #266 received at 61325 <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):

From: Ihor Radchenko <yantar92 <at> posteo.net>
To: Po Lu <luangruo <at> yahoo.com>
Cc: rms <at> gnu.org, 61325 <at> debbugs.gnu.org
Subject: Re: bug#61325: 30.0.50; Jokes in GNUS manual
Date: Mon, 20 Feb 2023 11:50:40 +0000

Po Lu <luangruo <at> yahoo.com> writes:

> In my youth, I took part in campaigns against religion.  Likewise, the
> word blessed is offensive to me.
>
> Will you now ``cater'' to me by retracting this change?
> If not, why should we cater to you?

I agree with you that we cannot 100% guarantee that no single reader
will be offended. However, it does not mean that we should have no
boundaries whatsoever about what to talk about in the manual, especially
in jokes, which do not carry essential information for understanding.

On one hand, we don't want to cater every single possible offence (like
text that offends a single person in the world, at extreme).

On the other hand, we probably don't want to joke around universally
disgusting/offending topics as, say, tortures described in details.

The above two are extreme boundaries.

RMS suggested that we must avoid jokes that offends users of the
software described in the manual.

This is another boundary.

I suggest avoiding topics __commonly__ known as sensitive at culture
level.

This is the boundary I propose here.

You example with "blessed" is not something commonly known as offending,
IMHO. "Sex" is.

-- 
Ihor Radchenko // yantar92,
Org mode contributor,
Learn more about Org mode at <https://orgmode.org/>.
Support Org development at <https://liberapay.com/org-mode>,
or support my work at <https://liberapay.com/yantar92>

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