From: James
To: ask_tim@oreilly.com
Subject: Just a thought...
Tim,
I am an avid fan of your books and publications and I own quite a few of them. I feel that they are well written and concise. There is however one little problem....
As I was browsing through your latest catalog that graced by mailbox, I happened to notice on page 23 of the new catalog a book called SATAN. As a Christian and a industry professional and programmer, I find the title of the book offensive and entirely distasteful. I know that others behind me will feel the same way. You have in the past titled your book in a very tasteful manner. This is going overboard and is stepping across the line of decency. I know that the acronym spells satan but there are other names you could call the program. Therefore, I regret that I am going to be unable to purchase any other of your books until you get rid of the book or change its name. I am also going to tell all the people that I know that you are not putting out books that are in the best interest of the people. At least keep the names of your books clean. I mean names like AWK and TCL, these are fine, but you have really stepped out of bounds on this one. You watch, I'm not the only one who is going to complain....
- James
James,
I'm sorry that the name of the program offends you, but, alas, it IS the name of the program. We can't do a book about Satan by any other name, any more than we could do a book about Perl and call it Programming Visual Basic.
I know conservative Christians have also objected to the BSD project's use of a little cartoon devil as a symbol for their software. Yet that usage is based on the pun between daemon (the UNIX background processes that provide services such as print spooling) and demon. But intelligent people are able to separate the origins of a word from its separate meaning.
This kind of thing occurs all through our language. This is "political correctness" (the liberal bane) reappearing on the right. Could a negative construction be put on a word or phrase? Well then, that negative construction clearly overrides the other meanings of the word.
I agree that it was in poor taste for the SATAN authors to use an acronym that might be offensive. But it pales beside the use of sex and violence on television to sell just about any product you want to name.
Still, you are most certainly entitled to your opinion. You can avoid the use of Satan to test your network security, and you can avoid buying a book about it. I would hope that you wouldn't penalize yourself by avoiding buying other books you might find useful.
Thanks for letting me know your feelings.
--Tim
