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Comment by paldepind2 | Hacker News Reader

I don't think this has anything to do with "American puritanism" or 21st century something. Giving a project a name that sound exactly like "cock" is just plain bad.

Imagine for a second that your favourite programming language or the one you use at work was called "Penis"? How would that change the perceived seriousness of the language? How fun would it be when you told someone "we use Penis where I work to implement our AwesomeSoftware™?

I use Coq on a daily bases and I've gotten many funny looks when talking about "cock" to people who are not familiar with it. It doesn't bother me much but there is nothing _positive_ about a name like that.

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> Imagine for a second that your favourite programming language or the one you use at work was called "Penis"

No need to imagine, "bit" is pronounced in French exactly like "bite", which means basically the same thing as "cock".

> How fun would it be when you told someone "we use Penis where I work to implement our AwesomeSoftware™?

You get used to it. Talking about "cock twiddling" sounds strange at first, and is annoying. But since we're French we can't really hope that this will change anytime soon.

Anyways, I'm all for changing the name, but hope we can keep the French origin. "LPC" for "Le Prouveur Coq" is a good idea https://github.com/coq/coq/wiki/Alternative-names.

It is not an ideal name, I agree. On the other hand, it is the french word for an animal, and not for the male genital organs.

What about the word bite (la bite) in french? Are we supposed to remove the word bit from the English language because it sounds similar to the french word for penis?

There is always going to be strange overlaps when it comes to different languages.

No, but you might want to take it into acccount if you're naming a software project lots of French-speakers will be involved with.

French have more humor when it comes to sexual references, it wouldn't surprise me if a name like that would actually be an asset. (Source: myself, French, living abroad).

Only if it makes sense for the product to make a sexual reference. (Source: myself, French, living abroad, worked in marketing/branding).

Coq is a bad name.

Or you know, Americans can learn that the world is not theirs, and they have no command or say over foreign words, just because they resemble phonetically (!!!) some word they consider shameful and sinful!

I'm confused why you think Americans are relevant to this story. The word "cock" and it's status as an English language vulgarity is a product of England. It predates the U.S. by centuries.

Because in 2021, the British are mature enough not to care.

It's those that inherited the culture of the puritans they've sent away that make a fuss about it (or some words on tv or make a huge deal about a SuperBowl nip slip).

Sure, but that doesn't really change anything about the fact that when an American hears "Coq" they also hear "cock."

There are many similar stories about English words sounding like profanity when (badly) pronounced in Chinese.

They're bad for branding and brands avoid them.

Now, I like "Coq" and the story about the cheeky French people trying to one up anglophones, but that's not really enough to make it a good name.

Then again I recall some people calling a compiler "Stalin" so, could be worse.

> Imagine for a second that your favourite programming language or the one you use at work was called "Penis"?

Except "penis" isn't ambiguous. Coq is French for cock -- as in rooster. If you have an issue with the name Coq, chances are you're too infantile to make meaningful use of it or contribute anything of value to it whatsoever.

In English. You forgot to point out that you comment was from a rabidly anglocentric point of view. There are, in fact, lots of other languages. Furthermore we like one- and two-syllable names for our programming languages. Being a quantitatively-minded person you will appreciate that this implies that it is likely that e.g. ruby means something rude in swahili or whatever.

The whole computer science/programming field is anglocentric and the problem with Coq doesn't occur just in english speaking countries. English is not my primary language, but since the sound "coq" doesn't mean anything in my primary language, and since everybody in my country speak english as a secondary language, most people will still parse the sound "Coq" as "cock" and think of the non-ideal english meaning of that.

A name accidentally meaning something bad in one language is a lot worse than a name intentionally meaning something bad in a language that 100% of its userbase speaks and understands.

>I don't think this has anything to do with "American puritanism" or 21st century something. Giving a project a name that sound exactly like "cock" is just plain bad.

You do know that coq is a perfectly fine french word, and also in the name of a big french sports brand, right?

Not to mention that "cock" is mere slang, the official word just means rooster.

Please don't use the word "pick". It sounds exactly like the Dutch word for penis.

Also don't use the word "could" because in Dutch that sounds like a nasty word for vagina.

Thanks for being considerate. There is nothing wrong with your English language, but sometimes it sounds offensive in mine.

Nah. I'm joking obviously. I do understand that in an international project with the dominance of English it makes it easier to take these things into account. I don't blame them for looking for a new name.

But the idea that the whole world changes their values and language constructs to not offend American sexual oppressive culture is still stupid. I do blame Americans for that.

> But the idea that the whole world changes their values and language constructs to not offend American sexual oppressive culture is still stupid.

I completely agree with that. If anyone demands that then that I would certainly not agree with that. But, I don't think that is what this is about at all. It's my impression that most people who think Coq should get a new name aren't "offended", they just think it's a bad name and that Coq should have a good name.

"Pick" actually sounds like penis in my native language (danish) as well, and I'm pretty sure that a danish company launching a product for the danish market would avoid the name "Pick". I assume that if you where to launch a product in the Netherlands you would avoid naming it "Pick" as well?

See also: Mövenpick the ice cream brand https://www.moevenpick-icecream.com/ where moven are birds

Well, Kavli (as in "Kavli Crispy Garlic" snack and the Kavli foundation) means "big cock" in Greek.

Would anyone be even remotely offended? No...

> I assume that if you where to launch a product in the Netherlands you would avoid naming it "Pick" as well?

Not really. But its not a fair comparision, because Coq isn't an American or British research project, its a french project. Its not even a commercial product or anything.

So i fully understand they want to change their name, but it is sad they feel forced to. Honestly, if someone is harressed by actual adults within a particular culture for using something that could somehow make a 14 year old little boy giggle, then i strongly suggest they leave whatever culture they are in, because its completely backwards.

The problem to infantile behavior and sexism in particular cultures isn't sovled by every other culture renaming their stuff to not trigger this behavior. Lets solve sexual harrassment in English speaking countries by the rest of the world avoiding doing anything that has any phonetic resembles to genitals. Does that not sound idiotic? Is that a not a weird English privilege that other languages don't get?

Again i understand and respect the decision by the project. In the end you just dont want people to get harressed. But lets not pretend the problem is the name. The problem is certain cultures lacking adult behavioral norms for men.

>How fun would it be when you told someone "we use Penis where I work to implement our AwesomeSoftware™?

It would be a non-issue for people beyond middle school?

And doubly so if the term was a regular foreign word.

Are people also taken aback when somebody asks for some coke with their food?

What prevents you and everyone else to just pronounce it as an acronym?

Whose fault is it they hear "cock" and they think of "penis"? We're not talking about GIMP here. It just means people have a dirty mind and don't know about the programming language.

Worse than a dirty mind: a mind that can't handle maturity.

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