I saw someone once mention a desire to change the term "master" in Git vocabulary and syntax to something more inclusive. I couldn't wrap my head around what massive upheaval that could cause with peoples' scripting, workflows, etc. across the world. Is that totally unrealistic, or can it be done?

It can be done
Any branch specific CI/CD would also need to be changed.

You just rename or push to a new branch and deal with the consequences, or you just don't cAre enough about snowflakes feelings and leave it as master.

@C0D4 And when/where does this stop? Can you imagine the full matrix of decisions to implement when dealing with potentially 100s of gender pronoun combos in UI code? The multiplicity boggles the mind.

People, this isn't Y2K. The lights are gonna stay on.

Its more like "Why 2020?"

@stackodev Is this an O(n*WTF) problem?

@stackodev I can, and hence my previous comment.

I don't force you (the snowflake in this case) to use my code, I don't encourage to either, if a word has detrimental affects on a person, they have larger issues at hand then my code having a "master" in it somewhere.

Also, I'm yet to actually meet a genuine person who can actually tell me why it's offensive to them specifically, so until then, I don't cater for the bandwagons nor care for them either.

@C0D4 I’m actually on the non-snowflake train. I can’t stand all of this obtuse manipulation of language and societal structure for the sake of first-world privileged people who have the luxury of not being able to settle on a basic gender like 99.9999999% of humanity does. I shall now calmly await my cancellation by other snowflakes in Devrant who will, no doubt, seek to destroy me.

@stackodev The issue isn't that people want other genders. The issue is that we all care too much about gender. The truth is, unless you are writing a dating platform, you have no reason to ask for the user's gender _ever_. You always want to know something else, eg:
Reproductive status: is the user capable of giving birth or providing sperm? An old lady is functionally equivalent in this sense to an eunuch or an asexual, and you shouldn't care which one it is.
Physical strength: It may be statistically more frequent in men, but why rely on statistics when you can ask directly?
Psychological properties: There are a million other questions that allow you to deduce that, why ask the single problematic one?
Advertisement target groups: Just don't. Use something, anything else if you must.

@Lor-inc Well, it matters much more for marketing than woke gender-obtuse people can handle accepting. Women and men really do purchase in much different ways. This is the case across all economic, national, religious, and other factors one can control for. The data I look at regularly bears it out. You could argue it’s all due to artificial social constructs, but left to themselves with all other constraints removed, humans have always diverged in behaviors directly on gender lines. All the way back as far as anthropologists can detect.

@stackodev Obviously, until 150 years ago for the general population the objective was survival so they distributed work based on the fact that women were somewhat more fragile and men were somewhat stronger. That isn't the case today, so it's high time we let go of this distinction.
And especially high time we let go of the concept that just because something was true historically or because it's natural it's necessarily good.

@stackodev I understand that data says it's still relevant, but this is a feedback loop that helps sustain this pointless restriction of human potential.

@Lor-inc so... I'll just change the question to

Do you currently have a dick?
Yes/No

I'm not asking you your gender, but I am still quantifying the same metric.

@C0D4 Yes. And this phrasing is much less covertly personal, so average people will have less trouble lying or getting upset about you asking it. Actually, from now on I think I'll use this as an example when reasoning why it isn't okay to ask for gender.

I just want to code. That's all that really matters to me. And I'll keep naming my branches master because It's how I learned it and it doesn't matter

I’m talking about differences in purchasing and other relationship-type behaviors for websites, behaviors that are simply manifestly true within a global average data set, and which can be controlled for outside of all other considerations, and suddenly I’m part of the patriarchy who wants to end suffrage and subjugate women. This woke nonsense has GOT to stop before it destroys our ability to have a normal, everyday average conversation about normal, everyday average things.

@Lor-inc @stackodev I kind of agree with both of you. How does that work?

@d4ng3r0u5 Seeing both sides used to also be a thing we could do. I can understand how people have gender confusion. The brain is a weird thing. But now we’re attempting to make everyone participate in a global shared delusion and it’s not a good thing for a stable, ordered society. Chaos will reign in 20 years because of this demolition of language and syntax.

@d4ng3r0u5 Our stances don't conflict each other. I think that being nonbinary isn't (shouldn't be) a problem, but I approached the issue from a different direction such that my conclusion relies on more widely accepted arguments.

@d4ng3r0u5 In a proper debate, the focus should be on mutual axioms rather than differences.

An axiom we all ought to follow is “let me do my thing even if you think it insane and I’ll let you do yours even if I think it insane. just don’t force me into your insanity and I won’t force you into mine.”

A corollary used to be “I don’t agree with what you believe/say but I’ll fight for your right to believe/say it.”

@stackodev To reply to your argument about target groups, by treating people differently you're making them different. I think that although there are countless other factors at play, differences in social status and options between men and women would be a lot less significant if the marketing industry didn't keep the stereotypes up.

It becomes a problem when a person running a simple survey or marketing campaign, or even a book author (as we’re now seeing with JK Rowling and death threats against her) can be prosecuted with a straight face in a court of law as a hate crime or hate speech, or openly persecuted by culturally sanctioned mobs. I cannot believe this is anything other than vengeful vigilante retaliation masquerading as “justice”.