Why Are So Many Programmers Arrogant?

Here’s one of the most hilariously accurate explanations of coders (i.e. “programmers”) that I have ever seen. It was posted on the Programmer’s StackExchange site by Alex Paven

The wild programmer (Scriptus exemplarus aspergerii) is generally a shy creature when in its natural habitat. While some deviant boisterous specimens do exist, they are the oddity rather than the rule.

He is content with spending his life staring at rectangular pieces of backlit canvas, and occasionally bashing on rectangular pieces of polished material. Come to think of it, most of his activities revolve around rectangles: the rectangular nutrient clumps he tends to favor eating, the rectangular primitive communication device he always carries around, the beige or black boxes he is so attached to, even organizing his workspace into cubes.

The programmer’s activity involves stringing together symbols in intricate patterns which they place on their canvases, obeying complicated self-imposed rules. They are inevitably proud of their symbols and compare them among each other to advance in the hierarchy. Some deem their symbols so valuable that they never show them to another, while others do the same for fear their symbols are not up to par.

Amongst themselves, they can quickly sense when someone is inferior to the standards they uphold, and most often attempt to enlighten less gifted peers; the same less gifted peers will often not take that kindly and, in a surprising twist, both consider the other group arrogant and come off as arrogant themselves.

When taken out of his natural habitat however, the programmer is utterly confused and sees the world around him as a great challenge. Anything that does not conform to the patterns clearly laid out in his symbols is deemed illogical and useless, which causes concern among humans (which is an entirely different species, despite the similarities). He will often try to improve various aspects of the world around him using the methods learned when dealing with symbols, and usually fail; however, his failure only gives him reason to point out that he actually acted correctly, and that outside influences (which are usually humans) are to blame for everything that goes wrong. This usually has the side effect of the same humans considering the programmer arrogant or stupid.

When dealing with programmers it is best to avoid upsetting them; however that may not prove an easy task, as their minds work very differently from those of other species. The best defense is to arm yourself with a modicum of information about symbols (you don’t have to understand them yourself) or even better, about specific symbols written by famous programmers. It’s enough to mention them to calm him down and make him go into a lot of detail on why those symbols are completely wrong and his are better. This is especially useful if you happen to remember symbols from a dialect that is opposed or otherwise dissonant to the programmer’s natural one (like C-SHARP [ˈsi.ˈʃaɾp] versus JAVA [ˈdʒavɐ]), although in some specimens it can also produce bouts of rage.

Also remember that due to his peculiar habits, programmers have a hard time reproducing and as such they are considered an endangered species. Efforts to instigate them to reproduce (much like in the case of giant pandas, Ailuropoda melanoleuca) have been mostly met with failure. So try to be kind to them, as they are generally docile and not a danger unless provoked by displays of misplaced affection or (what they would deem as) illogical thinking.

Programmers are part of our heritage and we should do our best to preserve this wondrous species for future generations.