[josai]

Without wishing to otherwise get involved at all, I'd like to say that as an Australian native english speaker, I have never heard of the word "kike" or that it is apparently a slur against jews. Why would anyone else in the world know that?

I have nothing against jews, but it pisses me off that some local slang is elevated into a global "character sequence you can't use", so long as that slang originates in NYC. Imagine if every other city had that privilege; we wouldn't be able to name anything.

[PhasmaFelis]

I take it that the original project said "kiked"? As an American, I wouldn't blame the creator for that since they clearly didn't know about the usage, and I think it's uncouth to assume malevolence here. It's not reasonable to expect people to exhaustively check anything they publish for bad words in any language on Earth.

Still, if you're publishing for an international audience, it makes sense and is polite to make a change once you've been alerted. I think Parro-it handled this very well. (Especially since, as others have pointed out, the proper English conjugation of "kik" is "kikked".)

This sort of thing does go both ways, BTW. There have been several significant media flaps over the word "spaz," which just means "clumsy/hyper/awkward" in American English, but is a pretty serious ableist slur in British English.

[jacalata]

As an Australian native English speaker, I'd heard of it - but I was a very widely read kid, which is probably where I came across it.

[nailer]

Australian here too, first time since heard it was when Michael Jackson used it in a song.

[kedean]

That rule usually only applies if the word doesn't have other valid uses. For example, 'cracker' is a racial slur for white people, but it also means an edible snack, so it's in the clear. To my knowledge, the word 'kike' does not have a non-offensive meaning, at least in the english speaking world.

[Dr_tldr]

Again, only in the United States. The word "kikel" is the yiddish word for "circle", and illiterate Jewish immigrants coming to the US didn't want to write an X by their name because they inferred they were being asked to draw a cross.

Once this was figured out as the problem, Jewish immigrants were instructed (in yiddish) to write a circle instead, thus they were referred to as "kikes" by immigration officials.

Since the origin of the term is specifically american, why should the rest of the world have to deal with it? You're not really addressing the original concern. Your theory of offensiveness as being "words with only one possible meaning" is fallacious, since again, that meaning is derived from the very specific mores of only one society. Very disappointing to see this kind of thoughtless "america is the center of the universe" opinion in HN.

[josai]

But no-one said "kike". You guys regexed it out of a larger word, a totally reasonable word. My point is that no-one but you would even have that word in their regex, so it's wrong to get all upset about it.

[phamilton]

Its origin is Ellis island, so definitively American slang.

[umanwizard]

Everyone in the U.S. knows this word. The U.S. is a majority of native English speakers.

[icebraining]

Native English speakers are a minority among all English speakers.