> a freaking text editor (something that was solved LONG ago)
It wasn't solved, it was replaced by a different, and worse, set of problems. Other people having minds organized differently from yours isn't evidence of a usability problem.
The problem with programming isn't the syntax. The problem is teaching a Martian to smoke a cigarette: Giving instructions to something which shares no cultural background with you and has no common sense.
(Of course, the classic 'teach a Martian to smoke a cigarette' problem is rigged, because the students are never told what instructions the Martian can follow; therefore, anything they say will be misinterpreted in various creative ways depending on how funny the teacher is. On the other hand, playing the game fairly by giving the students a list of things the Martian knows how to do would reduce the thought experiment to a tedious engineering problem.)
> Go and build a programming language your Mom can use.
This sexism is worse than anything else in your barely-thought-through rant of a post. The blatant, unexamined sexism in this statement keeps fully half of the potential programmers from picking up a damn keyboard and trying.
> This sexism is worse than anything else in your barely-thought-through rant of a post. The blatant, unexamined sexism in this statement keeps fully half of the potential programmers from picking up a damn keyboard and trying.
I'd throw in 'ageism' in there as well, being someone who is now 'of a certain age'.
I think you both are overreacting. "Something your mom could use" could easily be translated into "something a typical person could use." I don't think any girls or retired folk were dissuaded from programming by this comment.
Dissuaded by that single comment, probably not, but a constant flood of low-level sexual bias does send a message to girls that they don't belong. If you follow some of the gender-flipping reactions to pop culture, it begins to strike you just how pervasive these messages are.
The alternative "build a programming language that Dad can use" would have been much worse. I hope you see that. Unless gender bias is removed completely from our language (build a PL that your parent can use), the OP actually selected the lesser of two evils.
Wasn't aware that it was a strict dichotomy. There are plenty of ways to get the point across without gendering it. And I'm not trying to bash the OP at all. It's just that I do think it's important that we all hold each other accountable. But thanks for engaging, a lot of people don't even recognize there being a problem in the first place.
"Something your dad / grandfather / uncle" can use is just as apt. The point isn't "durr hurr you need a Y chromosome to do turing complete mathematics" its "99.99% of the population can't program. Write a language they can use"
That would offend even more as it strongly implies that "mom could never program of course, but maybe we could build a language where dad could?" If we want to be all PC about it, we should use gender neutral terms; like "something your parent figure could write programs with."
This is so absurd. There is absolutely nothing sexist about this statement unless you WANT it to be sexist. If a woman said this, would it be sexist? No. But a man saying it would make it so. What if a female programmer said "something your Dad can use"? Would she be sexist and ageist also?
Probably not. I'm a left-of-center guy, but I'm so sick of this politically correct bullshit coming out of left field. The complete inability to understand that not everyone is thinking of the broad, social contexts of oppression everytime they utter a statement.
You KNOW WHAT HE MEANT when he said that statement, but in the typical, annoying trait unique to yuppie white assholes, you seek to distance yourself from a heritage of being an oppressor by constantly pointing out racism/sexism/ageism. It's a game, and it doesn't matter whether what you are pointing at is REAL, AND AFFECTS SOMEONE, it just matters that you score your points to prove to the professional victim class that you're not one of the bad guys, even though you look like one.
Please, feel free to protest the JIF peanut butter slogan: "Choosy moms choose JIF". But no, there isn't an organized professional victims organization around single dads, so nobody will be protesting that, because why would you? There are no points to score.
Newsflash: Your parents and grandparents were probably racist bigots like every other cracker in this country. Your game does nothing to help. A woman who is being denied a promotion at work because of her gender will get zero help from your bullshit game. She will instead be hurt by it, because of the "crying wolf" that idiots like you do for your game that causes eye-rolling in 95% of the population.
but in the typical, annoying trait unique to yuppie white assholes, you seek to distance yourself from a heritage of being an oppressor by constantly pointing out racism/sexism/ageism
It seems to be a common tactic to accuse someone of white-guilt to quiet them down.
Fuck you and anyone who uses the concept of social justice as a hammer to try and silence people they disagree with. That is another serious barrier to actually solving any of these problems.
Social justice as a hammer is exactly the idiocy I was pointing at. Nitpicking a comment taken out of context as an affront to an oppressed group is exactly that.
It wasn't solved, it was replaced by a different, and worse, set of problems. Other people having minds organized differently from yours isn't evidence of a usability problem.
The problem with programming isn't the syntax. The problem is teaching a Martian to smoke a cigarette: Giving instructions to something which shares no cultural background with you and has no common sense.
(Of course, the classic 'teach a Martian to smoke a cigarette' problem is rigged, because the students are never told what instructions the Martian can follow; therefore, anything they say will be misinterpreted in various creative ways depending on how funny the teacher is. On the other hand, playing the game fairly by giving the students a list of things the Martian knows how to do would reduce the thought experiment to a tedious engineering problem.)
> Go and build a programming language your Mom can use.
This sexism is worse than anything else in your barely-thought-through rant of a post. The blatant, unexamined sexism in this statement keeps fully half of the potential programmers from picking up a damn keyboard and trying.