Sunday, July 13, 2003


Give Me An Effin’ Break


if you want to develop software, you can build for the Web and/or Unix and/or OSS platforms; or alternatively, you can be a sharecropper. - The Web’s the Place

Sharecroppers performed backbreaking physical labor for almost no money, and existed in an environment where a bad harvest or a duplicitous landowner could spell the difference between a survivable (but meager) winter and near-starvation.

Software engineers work in air conditioned offices, usually for at least decent pay, and have freedom of movement, self-determination, and the opportunity for professional advancement.

My aunt tells a great story of the night her grandmother (my great-grandmother) and her family headed north out of Mississippi ahead of a lynch mob, having completely torched a crop of cotton in the fields because the landowner tried to cheat them out of the proceeds they’d earned that year. She’d have kicked your pansy coding ass. Mine too.


:: Dave Walker 17:56 (EST/EDT) [+] ::

:: [/opinion/technology]
:: tags:

:: Comments (1)

Comments:

Justin Watt wrote:

Title:

Date: 7/31/2008 01:41:38

Response:
I thought about your post just now as I was writing some database code, referring to one db as master and the others as slaves. Innocuous enough, but maybe not? The problem I have is knowing where's the dividing line between drawing a comparison through the use of metaphor, and being downright offensive. Certainly I want to avoid the latter. Unfortunately that line is a fuzzy and moving. I'm sure it wouldn't take long for either of us to thing of words and phrases that we wouldn't bat an eye at, but in all actuality derive from some equally shameful past. Anyway, just thinking out loud...



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