TL;DR;

A few days later, someone pointed out an issue in SerenityOS where a new contributor offered to update the documentation to include gender-neutral language instead of always assuming the person building the project was a man. Kling rejected it with the statement: “This project is not an appropriate arena to advertise your personal politics.”

…Kling and the Ladybird project doubled down on rejecting active inclusion in the name of being “apolitical.” Others tried to explain that rejecting inclusivity is inherently a political decision.

If you’ve watched enough of these things play out, it’s usually the doubling down that causes a lasting split, more than the original disagreement.

So not some kind of JK Rowling transphobia or even stock republiQan misogyny as much as a fairly tone-deaf executive position on documentation that became a thing.

Making documentation gender-neutral is not radical or ‘political’ other than it’s trying to reflect the reality that more than just men use and create code. It seems like Kling thought his project was under threat of takeover by some radical pansexual furry anarcho-collective (not that there’s anything wrong with that) and said something stupid like “documentation isn’t a place for political debate” which, is sort of true and also not relevant to the change requested.

As the article states, the real issue is the doubling down. That’s not good.