referendum reference is needlessly annoying

[diziet]

BPO	39480
Nosy	@freddrake, @akuchling, @rhettinger, @terryjreedy, @mdickinson, @stevendaprano, @willingc, @opensource-assist

^{Note: these values reflect the state of the issue at the time it was migrated and might not reflect the current state.}

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GitHub fields:

assignee = 'https://github.com/willingc'
closed_at = <Date 2020-02-03.19:46:48.595>
created_at = <Date 2020-01-28.17:07:14.452>
labels = ['3.7', '3.8', '3.9', 'type-feature', 'invalid', 'docs']
title = 'referendum reference is needlessly annoying'
updated_at = <Date 2020-02-03.19:46:48.594>
user = 'https://bugs.python.org/diziet'

bugs.python.org fields:

activity = <Date 2020-02-03.19:46:48.594>
actor = 'rhettinger'
assignee = 'willingc'
closed = True
closed_date = <Date 2020-02-03.19:46:48.595>
closer = 'rhettinger'
components = ['Documentation']
creation = <Date 2020-01-28.17:07:14.452>
creator = 'diziet'
dependencies = []
files = []
hgrepos = []
issue_num = 39480
keywords = []
message_count = 6.0
messages = ['360883', '360906', '360910', '360939', '361133', '361321']
nosy_count = 10.0
nosy_names = ['fdrake', 'akuchling', 'rhettinger', 'terry.reedy', 'mark.dickinson', 'steven.daprano', 'docs@python', 'willingc', 'opensource-assist', 'diziet']
pr_nums = []
priority = 'low'
resolution = 'not a bug'
stage = 'resolved'
status = 'closed'
superseder = None
type = 'enhancement'
url = 'https://bugs.python.org/issue39480'
versions = ['Python 3.7', 'Python 3.8', 'Python 3.9']

[diziet]

The section "Fancier Output Formatting" has the example below. This will remind many UK readers of the 2016 EU referendum. About half of those readers will be quite annoyed.

This annoyance seems entirely avoidable; a different example which did not refer to politics would demonstrate the behaviour just as well.

Changing this example would (in the words of the CoC) also show more empathy, and be more considerate towards, python contributors unhappy with recent political developments in the UK, without having to make anyone else upset in turn.

  >>> year = 2016
  >>> event = 'Referendum'
  >>> f'Results of the {year} {event}'
  'Results of the 2016 Referendum'

>>> yes_votes = 42_572_654
>>> no_votes = 43_132_495
>>> percentage = yes_votes / (yes_votes + no_votes)
>>> '{:-9} YES votes {:2.2%}'.format(yes_votes, percentage)' 42572654 YES votes 49.67%'

[stevendaprano]

Oh come on now, this is such a trivialisation of the CoC that I cannot believe that it is a good-faith bug report and not a troll. I'm surprised you didn't toss in the words "triggered" and "micro-aggression" while you're at it.

The example has nothing to do with the UK Referendum (or for that matter, the 2016 referendums in Zambia, Columbia, Bolivia, or Italy): the numbers are completely different, the results and percentages are different, and there is no non-arbitrary way to map Yes/No of a made up example to either Leave/Remain or any other actual results. If you want to read the example as a better world where the majority of peole voted "No" to leaving the EU, then go ahead.

Why should you privilege the Brexit referendum over (let's say) the Irish referendum which voted in favour of allowing same-sex marriages? Or are you annoyed by that too?

Any year is going to "annoy" some fraction of the readers:

2019 is the year that the Liberal Party (don't be fooled by the name: they're the authoritarian-right, climate-change-denying reactionary-right party) won the Australian Federal election on a campaign of Facebook fake news, "annoying" almost half the country. It is also the year that President Trump was impeached, annoying half of the USA. 2018 was the year Vladimir Putin was re-elected president of Russia, annoying and *terrifying* some percentage of Russians. 2017 was the year that Trump was sworn in as US President. Shall we go on?

2016 was also the year that Taiwan saw the first ever majority by a non-KMT party, and the first female prime minister, when the Democratic Progressive Party won their elections.

By the way, the fact that I've just spent easily half an hour getting annoyed at this bug report and writing this response disproves your claim about avoiding making others upset.

[rhettinger]

I concur with Steven. The association with Brexit is specious and the CoC wasn't intended to apply to second guessing technical examples.