How to empty a Python list without doing list = []?

If the my_list variable is global, you can't do:

my_list = []

that just create a new reference in the local scope.

Also, I found disgusting using the global keyword, so how can I empty a list using its开发者_JS百科 methods?

del a[:]

or

a[:] = []

How about the following to delete all list items:

def emptyit():
    del l[:]