> If I write something that's accidentally a problem for part of my audience, I'll change it.
If original intent doesn’t matter, your audience shouldn’t differentiate between writing which is intentionally offensive and accidentally so. That is, they may as well assume you are malicious. That’s not the world I want to live in.
It’s also not the world we do live in. English is the most widely spoken language on the planet, and its speakers come from all sorts of cultural and educational backgrounds. They don’t have the time or the privilege of knowing about every term which can potentially be offensive.
My point isn’t that we shouldn’t change “groper” to something more inclusive. My point is that in practical terms intent does matter.
Please note that you went from my "doesn't matter a ton" to "doesn't matter" period. That's a straw man. If you'd like to argue with something I said, I'd be glad to engage. But not with a cartoon of my point.
It's more that intent was irrelevant than any intent should be presumed.
Word meanings drift and we update as we go. That doesn't mean the previous author was evil; it means they were writing in a different context and the context is defunct. Especially for a living document like the documentation of a still-used tool, modifying word choice to avoid unintended negative connotation is wise.
If original intent doesn’t matter, your audience shouldn’t differentiate between writing which is intentionally offensive and accidentally so. That is, they may as well assume you are malicious. That’s not the world I want to live in.
It’s also not the world we do live in. English is the most widely spoken language on the planet, and its speakers come from all sorts of cultural and educational backgrounds. They don’t have the time or the privilege of knowing about every term which can potentially be offensive.
My point isn’t that we shouldn’t change “groper” to something more inclusive. My point is that in practical terms intent does matter.