Offensive language in tree(1) manpage

Bug #325026 reported by Andrew
10
This bug affects 1 person
Affects Status Importance Assigned to Milestone
tree (Debian)
Fix Released
Unknown
tree (Ubuntu)
Fix Released
Undecided
Unassigned

Bug Description

Binary package hint: tree

The tree(1) manpage contains the statement:

"The IEC standard names for powers of 2 cooresponding to metric powers of 10 (KiBi, et al.) are gay." [1]

It is unclear to me what the intended meaning of this statement must be, as I am not familiar with the standard in question. I believe it to be highly unlikely, however, that any technical standard has a sexual orientation, leaving me only to interpret this usage of the word "gay" as pejorative and homophobic [2].

I realize that others may not share my personal opinion on the matter, but, irrespective of the larger issues at hand, it is in the best interest of any an open source computer operating system, Ubuntu perhaps even more so than others, to always stay well clear of controversial social debates.

--
[1] http://manpages.ubuntu.com/manpages/jaunty/en/man1/tree.1.html#toptoc7
[2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gay#Pejorative_non-sexualized_usage

Related branches

Andrew (andrewkvalheim)
description: updated
Revision history for this message
Jim Fisher (jedijf) wrote :

Thank you for helping to make Ubuntu better. This is confirmed in Intrepid also.

Description: Ubuntu 8.10
Release: 8.10

Changed in tree:
status: New → Confirmed
Revision history for this message
Andrew (andrewkvalheim) wrote :

This bug still exists in Ubuntu 9.10 and in Ubuntu 8.04 LTS. I'll admit that I know nothing about Debian packaging or writing manpages, but this *has* to be an easy fix. Here is a template to assist a developer with correcting the problem:

"The IEC standard names for powers of 2 corresponding to metric powers of 10 (KiBi, et al.) are ________."

Fill in the blank with an adjective of your choice that describes the IEC standard. Please note the additional change correcting the misspelling of the word "corresponding".

Revision history for this message
Twig (pfirth) wrote :

Hi,

Here's a patch which changes the wording and fixes the typo. This is my first patch so hopefully it's ok.

Thanks,
Twig.

Michael Terry (mterry)
Changed in tree (Ubuntu):
assignee: nobody → Michael Terry (mterry)
status: Confirmed → In Progress
Revision history for this message
Michael Terry (mterry) wrote :

I pushed this in. Thanks for the patch! Twig, I changed a few things:
1) karmic -> lucid
2) Use "LP: #XXXXXX" instead of just "#XXXXXX"
3) Remember to run update-maintainer to fix the Maintainer bits in debian/control

I've also emailed the author of tree, and will tell Debian too.

Changed in tree (Ubuntu):
assignee: Michael Terry (mterry) → nobody
status: In Progress → Fix Committed
Revision history for this message
Launchpad Janitor (janitor) wrote :

This bug was fixed in the package tree - 1.5.2.2-1ubuntu1

---------------
tree (1.5.2.2-1ubuntu1) lucid; urgency=low

  * Changed wording in tree(1) manpage (LP: #325026)
 -- Paul Firth (Twig) <email address hidden> Tue, 10 Nov 2009 17:14:52 +0000

Changed in tree (Ubuntu):
status: Fix Committed → Fix Released
Changed in tree (Debian):
status: Unknown → New
Changed in tree (Debian):
status: New → Fix Released
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