merge: deprecate the --force option The --force option in merge does not make what people think it does so it may not be visible to everyone. I have local changes and want to pull one's changes which made 2 heads. The --force option in help says -f --force force a merge with outstanding changes so I can expect that I can use it to force the merge and commit it in my local repository without taking my local changes into account. But merging with -f keeps local changes and "add" them: they must be committed or reverted before doing the merge commit. The merge -f cannot be reverted so it leads my repository in a bad state: cannot commit merge and don't want to revert/commit local changes yet. Message in help have been updated to emphasize the fact that local changes are included in the merge.