Texas realtors ditch term ‘master’ for bedrooms and bathrooms, despite it having no connection to slavery

The US war on offensive terms has claimed a new victim in the real estate sector, after a major association decided to call bedrooms and bathrooms “primary” rather than “master”.

The decision by the Houston Association of Realtors (HAR) was implemented in all its online listings on June 15, but was not noticed by the media until this week. The change may become a national industry standard, a statement from HAR cited by the Houston Chronicle on Wednesday said.

The legacy term is by no means banned though. The National Association of Realtors said it sees no reason why the word “master” can’t be used “as there is also no evidence that it has any historical connection to slavery or any other kind of discrimination,” according to its president, Vince Malta.

Terms that have no direct link to slavery but can be perceived as racist or offensive have been subjected to renewed scrutiny, in the wake of mass protests against police brutality and racism triggered by the killing of George Floyd in the US.

GitHub, Microsoft’s storage of code, popular among software developers, has decided to drop “master/slave” in computer science in favor of neutral “main/default/primary” and “secondary”. “Whitelist” and “blacklist” are being booted by Chromium, the project behind Google’s Chrome browser, as well as its Android team.

Meanwhile Minnesota, the ground zero of the anti-racism protests, is considering eradicating the word “chief” from job titles like “chief of police” or “fire chief”, on the grounds that it’s offensive to Native Americans.

Like this story? Share it with a friend!