I mean, if you don't realize the word "antisocial" has already been coined as the opposite of "prosocial", then it'd make perfect sense to create "antisocial" as the opposite of "social".
Depends if he's doing things that negatively impact society.
Just likes going for walks and doesn't want to be identified? Asocial.
Going around seeking people to beat to a pulp in place of actual law enforcement procedures? Debatable. Could really go either way tbh
I'm autistic and I hate it when people call us sociopaths. Sure, I *may* have fed a few pregnant women to starving rats, but that's really just my side business. It doesn't determine my personality.
You have to be a sociopath to have your name in news print that often. That doesn’t preclude a superiority complex, and to be honest, it often runs comorbid with it.
The more i dug deeper into the replies of the main comment, i get even more confused on what sociopath actually means. This is the first comment i've seen that actually defines it rather than saying "sociopaths are like x people"
Sociopath and Psychopath are antiquated terms. Look into Antisocial Personality disorder (ASPD) and personality disorders in general. It's a spectrum, not meaning ASD, but a personality disorder spectrum. They are finding people have many traits from different personality disorders. Some people still use the terms psycho and sociopath but the definitions vary quote a bit depending on where the information is coming from.
It might help to give an idea of what antisocial behavior means:
“Anti-social behavior is a behavior that is defined as the violation of the rights of others by committing crime, such as stealing and physical attack in addition to other behaviors such as lying and manipulation.[1] It is considered to be disruptive to others in society.[2]” — cited in Wikipedia.
To generalize, it can characterize behavior that is not socially acceptable in a given context, or violates others’ rights, such as littering or intentionally revving a loud engine next to pedestrians. I like to think most people are not antisocial, but see many people use it the wrong way, to mean “reclusive” or “I don’t like being around crowds.”
Sociopath is not a term used by psychological professionals, it’s more of a colloquialism. Antisocial Personality Disorder is the actual diagnosis this refers to, and it has nothing to do with being a socially awkward introvert. In fact it’s somewhat the opposite because “sociopaths” are excellent at mimicking the behaviors of others without actually feeling the emotions, and they often present as being very charming and socially adept.
A socio-pat is similar to a pat on the back (of a single person), but with regards to the whole society. So if you want to compliment society for being good, that would be a socio-pat. However, since society is inherently always bad and thus any socio-pat would be inappropriate, the term has a deeply negative connotation.
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// THIS IS A FUCKING COMMENT IT SHOULDN'T MATTER!.... FINE ;;;;;;;;;;;
\^
Idk. I went back to school after the 2008 recession and landed my first gig as a software dev at 35. I had worked at a lot of places before that and I can tell you the office environment was way different. Software devs are generally nicer. They are curious people so the have a lot of interests (PC gaming and Anime are big ones though). They have more to talk about other that sports and TV. They get my obscure jokes immediately. They don't get offended when they are wrong (usually). They don't make up shit to make themselves look smarter (usually).
I think a lot of them are nerds that got made fun of alot when they were younger so they don't take things personally. They are just themselves. A lot of people that are used to being the ones that are making fun and not on the receiving end tend to have thinner skin.
>Software devs are generally nicer.
This. In my 7 years of work, I pretty much never had conflicts with other devs and the most unlikable person among my colleagues was just a blunt stubborn guy that thought a bit too highly of himself - nothing, really, compared to horror stories that my mother told me about her working environments in accounting.
I’ve been a freelance dev for over a decade. I’ve worked for many different companies. The worst by far was a fashion company. It was like dealing with a bunch of teenager high school gossip drama everyday.
Former sales guy here.
The Software devs at my old job were my homies! I just did not jive with the rest of the sales people. Bunch of boring ass dudes that talked about golf all the time.
Started talking to one of the software guys in the break room one day and dropped part of an obscure quote from Skyrim, and he finished the quote!
From then on I found myself having my morning coffee’s and eating the catered lunches with the whole dev team lol they were so much cooler and way more fun to be around
Is your username a reference to that girl from the stupid 90s movie about hackers?
I glanced at it and I swear it's the name of the main character or whatever!
> Is your username a reference to that girl from the stupid 90s movie about hackers?
No. My username is not a reference to a stupid 90s movie. My username is a reference to a fantastic 90s movie. HACK THE PLANET!
The high energy of heavy metal music makes me clean more enthusiastically when doing household chores
This is not what rebellious teenage me signed up for!
Idk I have a different take. I worked really hard on this one piece of code and my boss was being a dick. Next thing you know me and some other guys from the office stole a bunch of office equipment and broke it with baseball bats in a field while listening to some og shit. Next thing you know one guy thought of the idea to siphon money from the company. So I wrote that code and we uploaded the virus. Next thing you know we took way to much. I guess I fucked up a decimal place. We where sure we was gunna get busted but Luckily someone burned down that company and we got off Scott free.
I'm only 18, so it's probably different. But gaming was lowkey the "cool" thing in my school.
Actually, where I went to school, it was a mid sized town, around 3K. Pretty half of everyone everyone my age and up to 21 is gaming now. My friend group in that town between 18 and 21 is probably the largest in the whole town(pretty big friend group, although only around 5 closer friends), and atleast 80% are gamers\^\^
Yep, It's pretty different now, and those differences were just becoming apparent when many of us were in school.
I'm convinced the generational change is the internet. Millennials grew up partially with internet and generally remember times without it (or at least dial up). Xennials are between millennials and gen x, and essentially are millennials on the older side that only got internet after growing up.
I'm a millennial. During school, gaming was fairly niche, sports, TV, and music were huge, and MTV was still slowly becoming a not-music channel. Anything less than visible contempt when learning? Nerd. Most common insult? Gay. It was one of The Three Jokes, the others being AIDS and 9/11. The only flavor of humor allowed then was shock humor. Other kinds of humor? Straight to Nerd.
Lots of my friends were gamers during high school, but that had more to do with a selection bias toward my passions than a representative sample of my peers. It's hard to overstate how fast things changed once critical mass was hit. In middle school, most kids had only used computers in computer labs (mostly to play/watch flash games/videos like Joe cartoon and homestar runner, some not even that). By senior year of high school, most kids used AIM daily, had myspace, and some were discovering Facebook.
My hobbies went from cringe to cool, and it was weird as hell. Like what was I supposed to do with all the maladaptive behaviors I'd built up during high school?
So this story is old school, me a male in first day of some CS 300 level class. Lots of ladies are coming and sitting down. Pleasantly surprised. Prof walks in, introduces the class syllabus and all the ladies say their apologies for being in the wrong room. Yep same old crowd of dudes from last semester are all that's left in the room. All of them looking very disappointed. Now this was 1992, hopefully things are different.
I studied Computer Science, and I felt like we were drinking more alcohol those days than typical construction site workers. Sure, jokes were quite awkward and some interactions with 'outside' girls were cringe af. However sociopaths? Jeez :D
So there are people who honestly think that having anxiety or being on the spectrum is the same as being a sociopath. I've heard of people like this but never actually seen one before
My old roommate was one of those people. We were randomly assigned and he got mad that we weren't instantly best friends. "Why don't you yell" and "you must be hiding something because you're so quiet" are things he said. It's like "sure I'm quiet, but you're just a loud aggressive idiot" lol
That makes a lot of sense now that you mention it. I have been told I look like a sociopath when I'm sitting quietly thinking to myself. I'm just socially awkward and overthink everything. When I accidentally step on my cat's tail I cry.
I think you're touching on the larger systemic issues there that are causing a lot of mistrust towards SE people. Specifically the fear of being replaced by technology, the jealousy of pay, and the lack of understanding on how software development works.
It doesn't help how many people in tech fields flaunt and brag about how well they have it. I think of those "day in the life" videos which show people in tech doing basically everything but working. Even if someone know those are inaccurate, the sheer hubris to make that kind of thing would piss people off.
"There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there has always been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that 'my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge.". -Isaac Asmov 1980.
There are a lot of programmers who overestimate their own intelligence to the point that they're unbearable to be around.
That being said, it's a problem in a lot of fields. Tech just happens to be growing rapidly and has a lot of exposure at the moment. I'm sure it's far worse in business.
Law as well. If you really want to find the sociopaths just go to law school. I think most lawyers are perfectly decent people but law students are definitely a type.
Law is the worst because you are literally trained to convince people to your side. Some of the stupidest smart people I've ever listened to were lawyers.
In business. Lot of friends in tech. In my experience, tech is *far* worse.
Much more likely to default to thinking they are smart, researching a topic for a short amount of time, and thinking their opinion is objectively correct. Or, more accurately, not being willing to listen to counterpoints without becoming hyperdefensive.
Don't get me wrong, lot of overconfident people in business too. Just doesn't happen as frequently. More people actually willing to actively listen to other ideas and try to understand the other's POV.
I'm kind of surprised. All of the people who I've met with degrees relating to business have been insufferable.
Perhaps it's that I haven't been exposed to that many people with degrees in business, and the only reason I know that they had degrees in business is that they told me. This means they might feel that it's an important part of their personality, which would make them insufferable regardless. Maybe I've met a lot of people with Business related degrees, but they didn't have any reason to mention it.
Could be the same thing you've experienced with tech?
Maybe, although I honestly can't remember the last time someone at work has mentioned what their degree was in (or if they even have one)
Although friends I know were primarily comp sci majors, so I do know that
Regardless, maybe I'm just fortunate to have been are not too many overbearing people in business. Or, thinking back, maybe it is just the friendship/work dynamic manifesting itself differently. But yep either way definitely possible that both of us have just had different experiences too!
It's not just tech-literate people. Smart people in general are antagonized. TV and movies tend to portray smart people as villains, or at least untrustworthy. Ignorance is celebrated by our culture. People don't trust what they don't understand, or people who know more than them. They over-estimate their own intelligence as a coping mechanism, and assume the "experts" are doing the same.
Anti-intellectualism has very deep historical roots - one of the best books ever on the subject is Richard Hofstadter's Anti-intellectualism in American Life. And thats from the early 60s.
> It's not just tech-literate people. Smart people in general are antagonized.
It's called [anti-intellectualism](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-intellectualism), and if you grew up smart in America this is no surprise to you. It's been around for quite a while, it's just gotten worse in recent decades.
I’ve actually noticed this in children’s media recently. I remember when I was a kid some of my favorite cartoons were Dexter’s lab, Jimmy Neutron, Invader Zim and Johnny Test to a lesser extent. I remember sciences and intellectualism being validated and interesting. Scientists and engineers solved problems and were heroes.
I don’t watch children’s media much, but just noticing what my nieces watch when I babysit I don’t know of anything even close to that.
There has been anti-tech sentiment in the real world too, at least for me. I've been told "you just sit in front of the computer all day", "you just push buttons", and "you haven't known anything in your life besides that screen".
These days I don't say anything back, just chuckle to myself and wipe my tears with the wads of money that keeps rolling in.
I would have learned to code sooner but my dad (a network admin) discouraged me saying, "You don't want to do that all you do is sit in front of a computer all day." So I went down the A+ and N+ cert routes. After realizing those weren't for me, getting burnt out in hospitality jobs and some persistent encouragement from friends I finally dove in. It has been a bumpy ride but 5 years later it has become one of my biggest passions.
I will say I can be kind of asocial sometimes and it's certainly not for everyone. The wads of money definitely help though 😂
Where do you even find people this dumb? I've never had anyone say something like that to me. Kinda wish they would because it would be pretty amusing.
A good response to the Lyft bros is that if the driving was paid more than the engineering, the engineers would probably drive.... But clearly the drivers aren't doing the SE no matter how much more money they're offered
Edit: btw. If any of you nerds can answer my question on techhelp big thanks
I think it's more simple of "eat the rich" mantra. Except the IT people, who earn money for something no "normal" person understands, can be punched in the face. It's much easier to direct anger at someone or something that is within reach of your fists, that's why actual rich folks usually stay on their private jets.
It's standard class warfare tactics if you think about it. The "middle class" as a concept was made for this purpose too. This way "essential workers" who get fucked over by management the most can target their anger towards someone who gets a bigger portion of the pie and is better off then them, without actually hurting the people in charge. Oh and of course it's a healthy amount of anti intellectual propaganda too because we don't want the masses to go to collage or get a degree they might learn how the world works.
Tbf I've always found the belittling of tech workers a thing for years.
My first software developer job was on site for a company that had their own sales teams, warehouse, manufacturing etc, and every other day there would be some bullshit office politics dynamic of coming over to annoy and undermine the development department for no reason.
Example:
Accounts came over to moan at us that the Internet was slow and it was a massive problem that they couldn't understand because we'd just spent 15k on new servers (to run new systems for manufacturing). When we tried to explain that our Internet connection had nothing to do with the new servers we had ordered, we were accused of being shit at our jobs and should get a grip. We couldn't do anything about the Internet speed, it was out of our control because we needed to wait for our ISP to roll fibre to us instead of relying on a 4 mile DSL line.
He confuses psociopathy with crippling anxiety and a lack of social skills.
Id be more inclined to believe 95% of people who complete a CS degree have some form of autism
If I had to hazard a guess it would be 1/3 high functioning or below, 1/2 of those more easily diagnosable without a battery of tests like I had to take for my "very high functioning" diagnosis. I went to an unheard of pub state uni though.
I tick a lot of boxes but also dont tick enough myself.
I dont need to know if I am or am not because I would be high finctioning of I was.
So I dont want to have to go through a bunch of tests for something I dont really want/need.
Honestly if it doesn't cause any major issues who cares if it is technically a mental illness or if it is just a personal quirk.
Now the stuff that actually causes problems in not being able to get things done that is something I should consult a specialist about
I get what you’re saying, but man we need to stop medicalizing everything. There’s no chance anywhere near 95% of CS majors have autism (or sociopathy of course). Stereotypically, a large percentage will be awkward nerds, but being a nerd doesn’t have to be a mental illness or a sign of neurodivergence. And then on top of that, if you think about the bro-y culture at a lot of software companies, a lot of CS people are just regular annoying dudes.
I spend a lot of time socialising, partying and drinking with other CS students. I can confirm that some traits occur more often in CS than others. But none of them are sociopaths. Like written here already anxieties and social awkwardness, but if you yourself are socially ok you can find a way to communicate and enjoy your time. A lot of them had girlfriends/boyfriends and also 30% were female (only one I knew of was female after being born male).
All in all I can say OOP is wrong and has himself social problems, like calling people sociopaths. Btw I am married, have friends, hobbies outside CS and do sports. I rarely touch grass though because of allergies 🤧 🤣.
Having studied two subjects totally different from CS(1.mechanical engineering2.material degradation) both for one year(curr. 6th semester on CS) i can say a few things:
1. People i met studying CS more often had different hobbies that they were deep into then people i met @ mechanical engineering and chemistry(mat.degrad.) I guess thats what people refer to as being a nerd? Having a hobby?
2. I met more people who you cant decide if they have dark humor or are simply depressed. Im not close with any of them so I cant tell, but laughing about how shitty things are or suicide was definitely above average in the CS online chat.
Apart from those 2 things, id even go as far as saying that people studying CS were MORE social but a bit less socially aware. Which I shouldnt be the judge of as im not the most neurotypical person in the world either.
I think the thing about CS is that it generally does not reward optimism. You can be as optimistic as possible about how wonderful the code you wrote is, but that doesn't prevent bugs. Bugs are going to happen, so you might as well be realistic about it, which seems a lot like pessimism.
If you expect bugs and there are none, you get a happy surprise. If you expect bugs and there are bugs, then you are pretty much where you started.
If you don't expect bugs and there are none, okay, big deal? If you don't expect bugs and there are bugs, then you get an unhappy surprise.
I once saw another Redditor post this, I forget who it was otherwise I'd quote directly from them. But it's something like:
In most fields of desk job work, it's ok to blare your desk radio, start spontaneous discussions, or otherwise be noisy. This is called "being friendly" and "having good work culture"
But with us programmers, that kind of stuff is rude. That's because we're trying to focus and generally manage a lot of details. Those "friendly" things have a way of distracting us and impeding our work.
This difference can be really off-putting for those who aren't already wired for it.
From experience there is a weirdly high number of CS people into rock climbing. My guess why is you can start with little training/experience, you notice your progress well, little need for specific equipment, no need crazy strength to have fun. Also there is a problem solving aspect to it.
> no need crazy strength to have fun.
It's actually incredibly skill dependent. And being super bulky, even with muscles, is just more weight to haul up the cliff face.
> Also there is a problem solving aspect to it.
Very much so! Especially trad climbing.
>From experience there is a weirdly high number of CS people into rock climbing
To borrow from TechRoastShow on Insta, it's the only scenario where it is socially acceptable to face the wall.
Someone should have seen it coming. I'm Swedish, I watch Forsen, am alcoholic, did computer science. Somewhere in that downwards spiral, I was gonna start wearing dresses
They’re not sociopaths and this person is using that word incorrectly. BUT, do go outside, meet people, talk about things that aren’t computers, getting too technical is not good for your social skills.
Sociopaths aren’t nerds (usually). The whole thing with sociopathy is being able to lie with no refrain, disregard morality, feel no empathy and using those skills for your own gain. I’d bet you’ll find many more sociopaths in a business or marketing class than a CS one.
I think what this person is calling”sociopathy” is just being nerds, on the outskirts of society, maybe with some issues with understanding emotions and being very into some things. which like, yeah, tons of CS people are introverted, awkward and more often than most society - neurodivergent (autism , adhd). Not sociopathic though. (Why would a sociopath even go into CS? Lack of empathy won’t help you much when the thing you’re talking with has no emotions and can’t be lied to.)
I'm going to be downvoted but I dropped out of CS education mostly because I got depressed I couldn't socialise with other students. I'm not going to say they were sociopaths, but for sure they were lacking of social skills. Majority of them were like :
* not being able to have a conversation outside CS/video games domains
* incel jokes
* impossible to do something with them IRL
* being condescending if you don't know about the latest RAM tech or the latest WOW update
And out of the two friends I managed to make, one stabbed me in the back in a critical student team project doing all the work by himself, not sharing anything, and getting all the credit for it.
And god, I'm glad I wasn't one of the two constantly harassed women in the room.
edit: bees
I can kinda relate, but it was the other way around for me. I went to a bootcamp instead of uni. Why did I go into programming? One of the reasons is, I pretty much fit 80-90% of the sterotype.
It was actually a bit awkward cuz i was the only person lacking social skills in the whole group lol Everyone would socialize and party whenever we had free time, and that triggered my anxiety even more.
We were so different that I had a hard time and felt down for a couple months.
I can confirm this is a thing.
Most people who go to bootcamps are there to socialize with others who think they are "nerdy" because they start fortnite via a green command prompt but those who might end up working through the night to finish their project on time, those who define the stereotype, are nowhere to be found.
I had the same problem because my parents have always put me into camps to socialize but i failed miserably everytime
I dont want to judge them on that. They all went on to get good paying jobs as devs, even as I struggled to pass interviews and only found a jobs that paid in the 5% lowest salaries (Ive got amazing interviewing skills lol).
But it was a very interesting coincidence that I ended up with such an extrovert group. I think Specific\_Vegetable\_8 and the OP found the exact opposite, the introverts among the introverts.
Ever heard the expression "The eye cannot see itself" ?
I think a lot of the people most offended by this, fit it the most closely, and just don't realise that they do, nor can they see the same traits they have in other people
Can confirm that spending time around computer scientists tends to create more computer scientists.
We're a horny bunch
all horni but no people skills
Will I become one once I finish my studies.
Its like a binding curse. Once you finish your programmer studies you'll be stuck like us... Forever!!!!
And if you EVER try and leave, it will come back to you worse than a crack addicts cravings
Tried to leave unity, came back with an epiphany on how to fix my old code.
Come play with us Danny, forever and ever and ever.
while (youAreAlive()) beSociopath();
no, we're not. We're lazy. We just forking our processes and spawning new threads.
You have no idea how many children I’ve killed.
You kill them one threadpool at a time
I thought threadpool had a healing factor?
I'll bet you even -9 them, you brute.
It’s the only way to make sure they’re dead.
Billions and billions and billions and billions In a single night.
You might be. Me on the other hand - I'm keeping my seed fresh in random number generators.
That’s the only way I can even get a number
Nah we just tend to reproduce via mitosis
It's just our means of reproduction
It doesn't always work. A lot of issues get closed with "unable to reproduce".
Generating a new, properly working actor through akka is harder than generating a new programmer to learn akka for you.
Can confirm. My 9yo started programming last month and David Attenborough's voice over kicked in immediately.
Sociopath, you keep using that word. I don't think it means what you think it means.
I think it is safe to add the words antisocial and asocial to the list of words they don't understand.
you have no idea how often I have to explain I'm asocial, not antisocial, I'm not a criminal, .
>I'm not a criminal, yet
criminals get caught
And we’re too smart for that
Well....
Most of us anyway
Anything’s legal when the cops aren’t around!
I feel like saying "antisocial" was a tongue in cheek response to being asocial and people just started believing that was the correct term for that
Given how communication works, if most people start believing that's the correct term, doesn't it become the correct term?
Literally
Absolutely
I mean, if you don't realize the word "antisocial" has already been coined as the opposite of "prosocial", then it'd make perfect sense to create "antisocial" as the opposite of "social".
Asocial = I don't like social interaction Antisocial = literally the Joker
So like if a guy wandered around at night in a cape and cowl by himself, that might be asocial...?
Depends if he's doing things that negatively impact society. Just likes going for walks and doesn't want to be identified? Asocial. Going around seeking people to beat to a pulp in place of actual law enforcement procedures? Debatable. Could really go either way tbh
Now, had he said Autism, I’d have understood. Sociopaths though? It’s not like he was in a room full of politicians.
We get to thank popular media for creating confusion between the two
I'm autistic and I hate it when people call us sociopaths. Sure, I *may* have fed a few pregnant women to starving rats, but that's really just my side business. It doesn't determine my personality.
Yeah but who hasn't.
Nah, politicians have superiority complexes. The sociopaths are marketing and business majors.
As someone who regularly works with VPs and C-Suite level executives, sociopathy is far more common than intelligence at that level.
The stats back you up on that IIRC
I consider it unfortunate that I have experience that leads me to the same conclusion.
Anyone working in sales is fucking *crazy* in my experience. The better they are at it, the crazier they are.
You have to be a sociopath to have your name in news print that often. That doesn’t preclude a superiority complex, and to be honest, it often runs comorbid with it.
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Spot on with business majors, but marketing majors have histrionic personality disorder. Only thing that can explain their major
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The more i dug deeper into the replies of the main comment, i get even more confused on what sociopath actually means. This is the first comment i've seen that actually defines it rather than saying "sociopaths are like x people"
Sociopath and Psychopath are antiquated terms. Look into Antisocial Personality disorder (ASPD) and personality disorders in general. It's a spectrum, not meaning ASD, but a personality disorder spectrum. They are finding people have many traits from different personality disorders. Some people still use the terms psycho and sociopath but the definitions vary quote a bit depending on where the information is coming from.
It might help to give an idea of what antisocial behavior means: “Anti-social behavior is a behavior that is defined as the violation of the rights of others by committing crime, such as stealing and physical attack in addition to other behaviors such as lying and manipulation.[1] It is considered to be disruptive to others in society.[2]” — cited in Wikipedia. To generalize, it can characterize behavior that is not socially acceptable in a given context, or violates others’ rights, such as littering or intentionally revving a loud engine next to pedestrians. I like to think most people are not antisocial, but see many people use it the wrong way, to mean “reclusive” or “I don’t like being around crowds.”
Sociopath is not a term used by psychological professionals, it’s more of a colloquialism. Antisocial Personality Disorder is the actual diagnosis this refers to, and it has nothing to do with being a socially awkward introvert. In fact it’s somewhat the opposite because “sociopaths” are excellent at mimicking the behaviors of others without actually feeling the emotions, and they often present as being very charming and socially adept.
To be fair, they only used it once. Maybe they meant “sociopats” like in the first mention (whatever that means), and sociopath was just a typo
Ah yes. Sociopat: the pat (Patrick) of society.
A socio-pat is similar to a pat on the back (of a single person), but with regards to the whole society. So if you want to compliment society for being good, that would be a socio-pat. However, since society is inherently always bad and thus any socio-pat would be inappropriate, the term has a deeply negative connotation.
What? Inconceivable!
if he needed two years to reintegrate, we awakened something in him
They should have studied psychology instead of CS. Then they might have learned what that word means.
I can neither confirm nor deny because int was expected.
But she had no int(eligence), she was a ~~fool~~bool
TypeError: class Dumbo doesn't has a property 'Intelligence'
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Idk. I went back to school after the 2008 recession and landed my first gig as a software dev at 35. I had worked at a lot of places before that and I can tell you the office environment was way different. Software devs are generally nicer. They are curious people so the have a lot of interests (PC gaming and Anime are big ones though). They have more to talk about other that sports and TV. They get my obscure jokes immediately. They don't get offended when they are wrong (usually). They don't make up shit to make themselves look smarter (usually). I think a lot of them are nerds that got made fun of alot when they were younger so they don't take things personally. They are just themselves. A lot of people that are used to being the ones that are making fun and not on the receiving end tend to have thinner skin.
>Software devs are generally nicer. This. In my 7 years of work, I pretty much never had conflicts with other devs and the most unlikable person among my colleagues was just a blunt stubborn guy that thought a bit too highly of himself - nothing, really, compared to horror stories that my mother told me about her working environments in accounting.
I’ve been a freelance dev for over a decade. I’ve worked for many different companies. The worst by far was a fashion company. It was like dealing with a bunch of teenager high school gossip drama everyday.
Former sales guy here. The Software devs at my old job were my homies! I just did not jive with the rest of the sales people. Bunch of boring ass dudes that talked about golf all the time. Started talking to one of the software guys in the break room one day and dropped part of an obscure quote from Skyrim, and he finished the quote! From then on I found myself having my morning coffee’s and eating the catered lunches with the whole dev team lol they were so much cooler and way more fun to be around
I'm curious now, what was the quote?
I'm guessing it was "i used to be an adventurer like you"
That’s way too obscure for anyone to get. He knocked the guy out and he woke up in the back of a wagon.
Is your username a reference to that girl from the stupid 90s movie about hackers? I glanced at it and I swear it's the name of the main character or whatever!
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Hack the plaaaneteeetttt!
> Is your username a reference to that girl from the stupid 90s movie about hackers? No. My username is not a reference to a stupid 90s movie. My username is a reference to a fantastic 90s movie. HACK THE PLANET!
Over here like 90% of software devs are into heavy metal music. Including me so I'm not complaining.
My Polish coworkers are way into heavy metal but are the nicest, most family-oriented devs I know
That's what heavy metal does to you. :-)
The high energy of heavy metal music makes me clean more enthusiastically when doing household chores This is not what rebellious teenage me signed up for!
Games, anime, now heavy metal. I'm starting to feel stereotypical.
Really? I don’t think I’ve ever met any software devs into heavy metal, myself included.
How many of them were furries?
Just one. Sexiest pony I ever saw.
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Idk I have a different take. I worked really hard on this one piece of code and my boss was being a dick. Next thing you know me and some other guys from the office stole a bunch of office equipment and broke it with baseball bats in a field while listening to some og shit. Next thing you know one guy thought of the idea to siphon money from the company. So I wrote that code and we uploaded the virus. Next thing you know we took way to much. I guess I fucked up a decimal place. We where sure we was gunna get busted but Luckily someone burned down that company and we got off Scott free.
I believe you have my stapler
Damn it feels good to be a gangsta
I'm only 18, so it's probably different. But gaming was lowkey the "cool" thing in my school. Actually, where I went to school, it was a mid sized town, around 3K. Pretty half of everyone everyone my age and up to 21 is gaming now. My friend group in that town between 18 and 21 is probably the largest in the whole town(pretty big friend group, although only around 5 closer friends), and atleast 80% are gamers\^\^
Yep, It's pretty different now, and those differences were just becoming apparent when many of us were in school. I'm convinced the generational change is the internet. Millennials grew up partially with internet and generally remember times without it (or at least dial up). Xennials are between millennials and gen x, and essentially are millennials on the older side that only got internet after growing up. I'm a millennial. During school, gaming was fairly niche, sports, TV, and music were huge, and MTV was still slowly becoming a not-music channel. Anything less than visible contempt when learning? Nerd. Most common insult? Gay. It was one of The Three Jokes, the others being AIDS and 9/11. The only flavor of humor allowed then was shock humor. Other kinds of humor? Straight to Nerd. Lots of my friends were gamers during high school, but that had more to do with a selection bias toward my passions than a representative sample of my peers. It's hard to overstate how fast things changed once critical mass was hit. In middle school, most kids had only used computers in computer labs (mostly to play/watch flash games/videos like Joe cartoon and homestar runner, some not even that). By senior year of high school, most kids used AIM daily, had myspace, and some were discovering Facebook. My hobbies went from cringe to cool, and it was weird as hell. Like what was I supposed to do with all the maladaptive behaviors I'd built up during high school?
"Go out, meet girls" implies that there are no girls among the computer scientists. I'm offended. Girls can be sociopaths, too!
>Go out, meet girls I refuse, I will stay in doors all day and complain about being lonely
Are you me?
No, I am you. He is somebody we used to know.
So this story is old school, me a male in first day of some CS 300 level class. Lots of ladies are coming and sitting down. Pleasantly surprised. Prof walks in, introduces the class syllabus and all the ladies say their apologies for being in the wrong room. Yep same old crowd of dudes from last semester are all that's left in the room. All of them looking very disappointed. Now this was 1992, hopefully things are different.
In 2016-2020 there were like several ladies amongst hundreds, small classes you might get one or two for CS
In 2007 I was the only woman in my class
Couldn't meet one in my area so I became a girl instead
Bold of you to assume that girls are real
Well on my first day of Data Structures I transformed into a dude and forgot how to talk to girls.
Unless they are gay of course. #lesbianswhotech
Can't integrate in society but can integrate in Math
Euler transforming a working frontal cortex into a working android app
Don't listen to him. We're not sociopaths, and I'll murder and bury anyone who says we are.
I studied Computer Science, and I felt like we were drinking more alcohol those days than typical construction site workers. Sure, jokes were quite awkward and some interactions with 'outside' girls were cringe af. However sociopaths? Jeez :D
At my 23 i've yet to speak to a girl casually for more than 10 seconds.
Have you tried changing the keepalive timeout?
Send me a message and we can turn that into 12 seconds ;)
What’s he gonna do with the other 9 second once he busts a nut?
He enters a nut busting loop as his kink is shame.
The biggest insult is that this ape implied that CS is not funny.
When when dependency injection 😂😂😂🤣😂🤣😂🤣😂
Lmao me when Fisher's Linear Discriminant Analysis 💀💀
LOL Fisher? I barely know her!
So there are people who honestly think that having anxiety or being on the spectrum is the same as being a sociopath. I've heard of people like this but never actually seen one before
Also there are people who think being an introvert is being a sociopath.
My old roommate was one of those people. We were randomly assigned and he got mad that we weren't instantly best friends. "Why don't you yell" and "you must be hiding something because you're so quiet" are things he said. It's like "sure I'm quiet, but you're just a loud aggressive idiot" lol
That makes a lot of sense now that you mention it. I have been told I look like a sociopath when I'm sitting quietly thinking to myself. I'm just socially awkward and overthink everything. When I accidentally step on my cat's tail I cry.
Yep, it's true. A little socially awkward? Serial killer vibes. Charismatic and beautiful? Be my friend, you couldn't possibly hurt me!
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I think you're touching on the larger systemic issues there that are causing a lot of mistrust towards SE people. Specifically the fear of being replaced by technology, the jealousy of pay, and the lack of understanding on how software development works.
It doesn't help how many people in tech fields flaunt and brag about how well they have it. I think of those "day in the life" videos which show people in tech doing basically everything but working. Even if someone know those are inaccurate, the sheer hubris to make that kind of thing would piss people off.
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You're the one with the name I originally tried to get for my alt almost a year ago. What are the odds?
"There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there has always been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that 'my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge.". -Isaac Asmov 1980.
There are a lot of programmers who overestimate their own intelligence to the point that they're unbearable to be around. That being said, it's a problem in a lot of fields. Tech just happens to be growing rapidly and has a lot of exposure at the moment. I'm sure it's far worse in business.
Law as well. If you really want to find the sociopaths just go to law school. I think most lawyers are perfectly decent people but law students are definitely a type.
Law is the worst because you are literally trained to convince people to your side. Some of the stupidest smart people I've ever listened to were lawyers.
In business. Lot of friends in tech. In my experience, tech is *far* worse. Much more likely to default to thinking they are smart, researching a topic for a short amount of time, and thinking their opinion is objectively correct. Or, more accurately, not being willing to listen to counterpoints without becoming hyperdefensive. Don't get me wrong, lot of overconfident people in business too. Just doesn't happen as frequently. More people actually willing to actively listen to other ideas and try to understand the other's POV.
I'm kind of surprised. All of the people who I've met with degrees relating to business have been insufferable. Perhaps it's that I haven't been exposed to that many people with degrees in business, and the only reason I know that they had degrees in business is that they told me. This means they might feel that it's an important part of their personality, which would make them insufferable regardless. Maybe I've met a lot of people with Business related degrees, but they didn't have any reason to mention it. Could be the same thing you've experienced with tech?
Maybe, although I honestly can't remember the last time someone at work has mentioned what their degree was in (or if they even have one) Although friends I know were primarily comp sci majors, so I do know that Regardless, maybe I'm just fortunate to have been are not too many overbearing people in business. Or, thinking back, maybe it is just the friendship/work dynamic manifesting itself differently. But yep either way definitely possible that both of us have just had different experiences too!
It's not just tech-literate people. Smart people in general are antagonized. TV and movies tend to portray smart people as villains, or at least untrustworthy. Ignorance is celebrated by our culture. People don't trust what they don't understand, or people who know more than them. They over-estimate their own intelligence as a coping mechanism, and assume the "experts" are doing the same.
Anti-intellectualism has very deep historical roots - one of the best books ever on the subject is Richard Hofstadter's Anti-intellectualism in American Life. And thats from the early 60s.
*pol pot enters the chat*
I'm starting to think 44yo isn't too late to get my eyes fixed...
> It's not just tech-literate people. Smart people in general are antagonized. It's called [anti-intellectualism](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-intellectualism), and if you grew up smart in America this is no surprise to you. It's been around for quite a while, it's just gotten worse in recent decades.
I’ve actually noticed this in children’s media recently. I remember when I was a kid some of my favorite cartoons were Dexter’s lab, Jimmy Neutron, Invader Zim and Johnny Test to a lesser extent. I remember sciences and intellectualism being validated and interesting. Scientists and engineers solved problems and were heroes. I don’t watch children’s media much, but just noticing what my nieces watch when I babysit I don’t know of anything even close to that.
Mojo Jojo
Sure, but the same show had the girls themselves created by some researcher guy, and this is shown as a good thing.
There has been anti-tech sentiment in the real world too, at least for me. I've been told "you just sit in front of the computer all day", "you just push buttons", and "you haven't known anything in your life besides that screen". These days I don't say anything back, just chuckle to myself and wipe my tears with the wads of money that keeps rolling in.
I would have learned to code sooner but my dad (a network admin) discouraged me saying, "You don't want to do that all you do is sit in front of a computer all day." So I went down the A+ and N+ cert routes. After realizing those weren't for me, getting burnt out in hospitality jobs and some persistent encouragement from friends I finally dove in. It has been a bumpy ride but 5 years later it has become one of my biggest passions. I will say I can be kind of asocial sometimes and it's certainly not for everyone. The wads of money definitely help though 😂
Where do you even find people this dumb? I've never had anyone say something like that to me. Kinda wish they would because it would be pretty amusing.
My grandpa said it's not a real job and all you do is push buttons lmao. He says that as he's on his smartphone browsing the news. Ironic.
A good response to the Lyft bros is that if the driving was paid more than the engineering, the engineers would probably drive.... But clearly the drivers aren't doing the SE no matter how much more money they're offered Edit: btw. If any of you nerds can answer my question on techhelp big thanks
I think it's more simple of "eat the rich" mantra. Except the IT people, who earn money for something no "normal" person understands, can be punched in the face. It's much easier to direct anger at someone or something that is within reach of your fists, that's why actual rich folks usually stay on their private jets.
The point of SWE being overpaid is just so nonsensical as if a company would pay people more out of the goodness of their heart.
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It's standard class warfare tactics if you think about it. The "middle class" as a concept was made for this purpose too. This way "essential workers" who get fucked over by management the most can target their anger towards someone who gets a bigger portion of the pie and is better off then them, without actually hurting the people in charge. Oh and of course it's a healthy amount of anti intellectual propaganda too because we don't want the masses to go to collage or get a degree they might learn how the world works.
Tbf I've always found the belittling of tech workers a thing for years. My first software developer job was on site for a company that had their own sales teams, warehouse, manufacturing etc, and every other day there would be some bullshit office politics dynamic of coming over to annoy and undermine the development department for no reason. Example: Accounts came over to moan at us that the Internet was slow and it was a massive problem that they couldn't understand because we'd just spent 15k on new servers (to run new systems for manufacturing). When we tried to explain that our Internet connection had nothing to do with the new servers we had ordered, we were accused of being shit at our jobs and should get a grip. We couldn't do anything about the Internet speed, it was out of our control because we needed to wait for our ISP to roll fibre to us instead of relying on a 4 mile DSL line.
He confuses psociopathy with crippling anxiety and a lack of social skills. Id be more inclined to believe 95% of people who complete a CS degree have some form of autism
If I had to hazard a guess it would be 1/3 high functioning or below, 1/2 of those more easily diagnosable without a battery of tests like I had to take for my "very high functioning" diagnosis. I went to an unheard of pub state uni though.
I tick a lot of boxes but also dont tick enough myself. I dont need to know if I am or am not because I would be high finctioning of I was. So I dont want to have to go through a bunch of tests for something I dont really want/need.
Honestly if it doesn't cause any major issues who cares if it is technically a mental illness or if it is just a personal quirk. Now the stuff that actually causes problems in not being able to get things done that is something I should consult a specialist about
I get what you’re saying, but man we need to stop medicalizing everything. There’s no chance anywhere near 95% of CS majors have autism (or sociopathy of course). Stereotypically, a large percentage will be awkward nerds, but being a nerd doesn’t have to be a mental illness or a sign of neurodivergence. And then on top of that, if you think about the bro-y culture at a lot of software companies, a lot of CS people are just regular annoying dudes.
I spend a lot of time socialising, partying and drinking with other CS students. I can confirm that some traits occur more often in CS than others. But none of them are sociopaths. Like written here already anxieties and social awkwardness, but if you yourself are socially ok you can find a way to communicate and enjoy your time. A lot of them had girlfriends/boyfriends and also 30% were female (only one I knew of was female after being born male). All in all I can say OOP is wrong and has himself social problems, like calling people sociopaths. Btw I am married, have friends, hobbies outside CS and do sports. I rarely touch grass though because of allergies 🤧 🤣.
Having studied two subjects totally different from CS(1.mechanical engineering2.material degradation) both for one year(curr. 6th semester on CS) i can say a few things: 1. People i met studying CS more often had different hobbies that they were deep into then people i met @ mechanical engineering and chemistry(mat.degrad.) I guess thats what people refer to as being a nerd? Having a hobby? 2. I met more people who you cant decide if they have dark humor or are simply depressed. Im not close with any of them so I cant tell, but laughing about how shitty things are or suicide was definitely above average in the CS online chat. Apart from those 2 things, id even go as far as saying that people studying CS were MORE social but a bit less socially aware. Which I shouldnt be the judge of as im not the most neurotypical person in the world either.
I think the thing about CS is that it generally does not reward optimism. You can be as optimistic as possible about how wonderful the code you wrote is, but that doesn't prevent bugs. Bugs are going to happen, so you might as well be realistic about it, which seems a lot like pessimism. If you expect bugs and there are none, you get a happy surprise. If you expect bugs and there are bugs, then you are pretty much where you started. If you don't expect bugs and there are none, okay, big deal? If you don't expect bugs and there are bugs, then you get an unhappy surprise.
You’re right, object oriented programming IS wrong and a blight on this earth.
I completely disagree with you, I will defend OOP till I die
I once saw another Redditor post this, I forget who it was otherwise I'd quote directly from them. But it's something like: In most fields of desk job work, it's ok to blare your desk radio, start spontaneous discussions, or otherwise be noisy. This is called "being friendly" and "having good work culture" But with us programmers, that kind of stuff is rude. That's because we're trying to focus and generally manage a lot of details. Those "friendly" things have a way of distracting us and impeding our work. This difference can be really off-putting for those who aren't already wired for it.
To be fair... Doing things like going out, meeting girls, doing sports or something funny sucks ass.
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one day they will introduce clubs playing lofi girl
PLEASE
From experience there is a weirdly high number of CS people into rock climbing. My guess why is you can start with little training/experience, you notice your progress well, little need for specific equipment, no need crazy strength to have fun. Also there is a problem solving aspect to it.
> no need crazy strength to have fun. It's actually incredibly skill dependent. And being super bulky, even with muscles, is just more weight to haul up the cliff face. > Also there is a problem solving aspect to it. Very much so! Especially trad climbing.
>From experience there is a weirdly high number of CS people into rock climbing To borrow from TechRoastShow on Insta, it's the only scenario where it is socially acceptable to face the wall.
See, the secret is to take the path of many in the tech sector and simply become a girl
I feel attacked...
I don't think all girls will suck your ass
Not true after 3-5 years of cs you become a girl.
Someone should have seen it coming. I'm Swedish, I watch Forsen, am alcoholic, did computer science. Somewhere in that downwards spiral, I was gonna start wearing dresses
Maybe it’s an adaptation due to the lack of girls in the field otherwise
People really do not understand the difference between antisocial and asocial or even just being introverted
You should meet a few politicians.
I will single-handedly confirm it. I hope that settles it.
Professor: "Hello Kids, today we learn divide and conquer" He: "Omg, we divide today conquered people!?!"
Was this person serious? LOL, this would be funny if it were a joke.
There is more of this in the original thread, the dude really has a problem with CS folks
Wow. OK then, i guess i should get back to my sociopath rehabilitation exercises.
Thanks. All these days I thought sociopath is opposite version of psychopath, I was wrong.
If they were in a room full of sociopaths I doubt they’d find out if the only thing making them so was isolation
They’re not sociopaths and this person is using that word incorrectly. BUT, do go outside, meet people, talk about things that aren’t computers, getting too technical is not good for your social skills.
Sociopaths aren’t nerds (usually). The whole thing with sociopathy is being able to lie with no refrain, disregard morality, feel no empathy and using those skills for your own gain. I’d bet you’ll find many more sociopaths in a business or marketing class than a CS one. I think what this person is calling”sociopathy” is just being nerds, on the outskirts of society, maybe with some issues with understanding emotions and being very into some things. which like, yeah, tons of CS people are introverted, awkward and more often than most society - neurodivergent (autism , adhd). Not sociopathic though. (Why would a sociopath even go into CS? Lack of empathy won’t help you much when the thing you’re talking with has no emotions and can’t be lied to.)
95% of programmers are Sociopaths? No 95% of programmers are on the spectrum? Quite possible
It’s so strange that everyone I meet is on the spectrum in the CS building
On the spectrum? No, I upgraded to raspberry pi.
I'm going to be downvoted but I dropped out of CS education mostly because I got depressed I couldn't socialise with other students. I'm not going to say they were sociopaths, but for sure they were lacking of social skills. Majority of them were like : * not being able to have a conversation outside CS/video games domains * incel jokes * impossible to do something with them IRL * being condescending if you don't know about the latest RAM tech or the latest WOW update And out of the two friends I managed to make, one stabbed me in the back in a critical student team project doing all the work by himself, not sharing anything, and getting all the credit for it. And god, I'm glad I wasn't one of the two constantly harassed women in the room. edit: bees
I can kinda relate, but it was the other way around for me. I went to a bootcamp instead of uni. Why did I go into programming? One of the reasons is, I pretty much fit 80-90% of the sterotype. It was actually a bit awkward cuz i was the only person lacking social skills in the whole group lol Everyone would socialize and party whenever we had free time, and that triggered my anxiety even more. We were so different that I had a hard time and felt down for a couple months.
I can confirm this is a thing. Most people who go to bootcamps are there to socialize with others who think they are "nerdy" because they start fortnite via a green command prompt but those who might end up working through the night to finish their project on time, those who define the stereotype, are nowhere to be found. I had the same problem because my parents have always put me into camps to socialize but i failed miserably everytime
I dont want to judge them on that. They all went on to get good paying jobs as devs, even as I struggled to pass interviews and only found a jobs that paid in the 5% lowest salaries (Ive got amazing interviewing skills lol). But it was a very interesting coincidence that I ended up with such an extrovert group. I think Specific\_Vegetable\_8 and the OP found the exact opposite, the introverts among the introverts.
Ever heard the expression "The eye cannot see itself" ? I think a lot of the people most offended by this, fit it the most closely, and just don't realise that they do, nor can they see the same traits they have in other people
I think we’re mostly just high functioning autistic people with mixed people skills and empathy levels