For people who don't see what's wrong here. The issue is not about whether the word 'retard' is or is not offensive to anyone. You need to consider that GitHub currently hosts a large percentage of the web's open source repositories. This is censorship plain and simple, something that IMO has no place in open source. The issue is that there are plenty of things some people might find offensive on GitHub but you dont see them threatening everyone with takedown notices. It is the selective censorship of certain reasonable uses of free speech that is concerning here. Retarded is off limits, but cursing is okay (maybe?). Who decides what is and is not appropriate?
It sounds like entitlement to me.
Just because it's an open source project, does not grant the author free pass to do whatever he/she likes. If I come and visit someone at their house, I make sure I observe their house rules.
So GitHub makes it clear that this is unacceptable. Whilst their actions / decisions may sometimes look arbitrary, we need to remember that GitHub is not just one person.
In addition, in a public space you would expect respectful public decorum. This repository is publicly visible and anyone could stumble upon it.
I know of one country that operates a web content filter to prevent its citizens from being exposed to offensive and objectionable content. The citizens of this country find it incredibly offensive that there exists instructions on how to circumvent this filter. However, github proudly hosts these instructions[1] in spite of repeated polite requests to remove it.
Now I'd like to know why the views of Bay Area SJWs is worth listening to, but not Chinese people. If we can censor words like this, why can't we censor content that actually harms (/s) a lot of Chinese people?
So what you're saying is that you're afraid that GitHub will go down the slippery slope of censorship?
If I reframe this another way, do you think this is an acceptable behaviour in a professional setting? Then the issue becomes less of censorship, but more of acceptable conduct.
Calling names for laughs is probably OK in private, between friends, but perhaps not appropriate in a public setting.
Again, I get that the author is just having a bit of fun. But not everyone will understand that.
Github's previous policy was to allow any content that did not expressly break American laws. I thought this was a good idea, and it was the justification behind keeping the GreatFire repo up, even in the face of DoS attacks by China. Very commendable, IMO. However, when they start censoring people who break no laws, I do think they are more likely to censor things in the future.
Lastly, I'd like to point out that "git" is an offensive word to some people. It was chosen by Linus Torvalds for that reason. Now that Github has demonstrated their willingness to censor words that hurt people's feelings, would they consider censoring this awful project? [1] While they're at it, could they change their name too?