The GIL is controversial because it only allows one thread at a time to access the Python interpreter. This means that it’s often not possible for threads to take advantage of multi-core systems.

Taking this rice on a chessboard scenario to its logical, exponential conclusion achieves effectively infinite CPU speeds in a relatively short period of time. Python multithreading Guided by this ...

The global interpreter lock is both a key component of the Python runtime and a major obstacle to multithreading. These are the plans to get around it or get rid of it.