Call yourself a 'brogrammer'? Then get the hell away from me.

http://blog.jgc.org/2012/03/call-yourself-brogrammer-then-get-hell.html

by jgrahamc • 14 years ago

190 112 14 years ago

blog.jgc.org

_delirium3• 14 years ago

Huh, I had thought the "brogrammer" thing was a parody, not a serious self-description. I usually run across variants of the descriptor "bro-ish" as derogatory, not something people actually want to call themselves; for example, "brostep" is a derogatory term for a subgenre of dubstep that dubstep purists don't like, not something people proudly call their own music. But I'm admittedly totally out of this particular loop.

swiecki• 14 years ago

I totally agree with this. I thought it was a joke. I didn't think frat guys were actually learning to code and calling themselves programmers or something...

The point of this blog post is basically that it doesn't matter if you program or what, if you're a douche, you are a douche.

potatolicious• 14 years ago

I thought so too, but the word I hear from people I know at Facebook (where the term originated) indicate that the people who started this are pretty dead serious about the concept.

Thankfully I work with no brogrammers - this might actually start being a hiring disadvantage if companies are known to be brogrammer-heavy.

aValidUserName3• 14 years ago

It's a very useful indicator that the company is looking to hire barely-sentient PHP monkeys rather than actual programmers to solve interesting problems.

peterhunt• 14 years ago

Brogramming has always been a joke at FB.

jiggy20117• 14 years ago

Problem is , if this catches on with recruiters who will use it very non ironically like "rockstar".

How long until we see "Brogrammer needed" ads

_delirium3• 14 years ago

Now that I think of it, there was actually a YC company's recruiting post on HN that used it (not entirely clear how seriously), which created a bit of a backlash: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3168038

I think it's probably not a good recruiting strategy, because it telegraphs both that this might be a problematic opening for women, and that anyone worried they'll be deemed too egghead/nerdy might want to pass. Even if you don't care about sexism (which you should), a job ad that implies that nerdy programmers may not be welcome really restricts the size of the candidate pool. On the other hand, if that's the company culture, maybe it's better to know ahead of time...

drtse42• 14 years ago

And would that be a problem? Not that we need a method to spot bad recruiters, but for those who still think that it makes sense to evaluate quality, what you describe could be a good method to identify the most degenerate ones.

ktsmith• 14 years ago

There's been a few posts on here and reddit about brogrammers at facebook and zynga that were completely serious. If I recall correctly there was a recruitment post here not that long ago where the entire post was about looking for "brogrammers" and based on the comments of the poster he was 100% completely serious even with the negative feedback from the other posters.

castillowl• 14 years ago

Whoa bro. Take it out at the gym

DarkShikari• 14 years ago

From Urban Dictionary:

brogrammer, n.: A programmer who breaks the usual expectations of quiet nerdiness and opts instead for the usual trappings of a frat-boy: popped collars, bad beer, and calling everybody "bro". Despised by everyone, especially other programmers.

Ex: Oh my god, John is talking about football and chicks again. That guy is such a brogrammer.

See also: programmer, frat boy, bro, douchebag, developer

This is not a good stereotype to conjure up, even in some ironic-parody-hipster sense.

It isn't a joke, either; I've definitely seen programmers where I've worked who really do act like that -- and they are like toxin for introverted programmers. Most other programmers probably don't appreciate a "bro" constantly talking about his sexual conquests instead of interesting technical topics or hobbies.

tokenadult• 14 years ago

Most other programmers probably don't appreciate a "bro" constantly talking about his sexual conquests instead of interesting technical topics or hobbies.

Definitely. I can hardly imagine anything more off-putting. Alas, I have seen that kind of crude bragging in Hacker News comments every once in a while. The Hacker News readership skews young, so many of the participants here are still trying to establish long-term relationships. As someone who is approaching thirty years of marriage, I no longer have the preoccupation of finding the next girl--and I really never did, as I was looking for the ONE girl I could count on to be a good wife for a lifetime and a good mother for any children we happened to have. It has not escaped my notice that many Hacker News participants are still looking for ways to build a deep relationship with someone. I don't think bragging up one-night stands provides answers for the many readers here who have questions about that.

lizzard• 14 years ago

Hipster irony that sounds and behaves exactly like actual misogyny, as far as I'm concerned, is actual misogyny.

A lot of bigotry and exclusionary behavior is couched in terms of being "just a joke".

fuzzix• 14 years ago

"It isn't a joke, either"

My predecessor at the current job fits the description - he was renowned for his sexist remarks and attitude. Don't know if he regards himself a "brogrammer".

Turns out a guy who doesn't give a shit what people think of his personality also doesn't give a shit about his code...

I would apply the term "brogrammer" to him in a strictly pejorative sense.

rsanchez1• 14 years ago

It's what happens when you have people going to college to hang out in frat houses instead of actually learning.

kenkam• 14 years ago

I am somewhat relieved that they have managed to create a new word to describe only a subset of programmers -- I would be ashamed and no longer proud to call myself a programmer if this becomes widespread...

... and you don't have to be a bro to have fun.

coderdude• 14 years ago

Part of it can come from who you've grown up around. To draw from my own experience, I think I've had one technically inclined IRL friend ever. Everyone else has been a non-developer/designer, non-programmer, or barely computer literate. What happened to me was at age 10 we got a computer and I've been absolutely obsessed with creation ever since.

This led to mannerisms, interests, and an external appearance adapted from my peers, but also to a quiet (though dominant) side of me that spends 20 of 24 hours each day pounding away at my keyboard. If I ever came across another programmer in the wild I'm not sure how I would be received.

It's weird to not fit in anywhere. But these guys just sound like douchebags.

Truth be told this 'us vs. them' is a relic of the Revenge of the Nerds days. Saying things like "no you're a bro you can't be one of us" or yelling "neeerrrrrrds" is exactly the same thing. As time wears on, the techs will seem to get less awkward and the bros will seems to get less "bro-y." It's the convergence that occurs once the social stigma of the 80s has worn off.

It should be noted though that tech conversation and "testosterversation" are really difficult to mix. If you're in one mode you don't want to keep switching back to the other.

gte910h• 14 years ago

The odd thing is, I've never met a guy in a fraternity like this.

sc00ter• 14 years ago

Ironic then that is the commentator (not quite antagonist) in the "Example" who exclaims "OMG"!

jiggy20117• 14 years ago

This is nothing new, back in ~2004 when I was at university for CS there were plenty of students who were desperate to shed the "nerdy" image and would compensate taking up macho hobbies like bodybuilding , playing metal music, martial arts or motorcycling or by drinking large amounts and getting high every weekend.

The whole brogrammer meme reminds me a lot of DHH. Whenever you see him speak he is always dressed and groomed well and fashionably , likes to swear a lot and has a keen interest in fast cars.

It also reminds me of the sorts of people who are into PUA manuals.

_bbs• 14 years ago

Is there really a problem with nerds being groomed well and fashionably dressed? The people they describe are off-putting because of their attitude, not because their appearance clashes with the archetypal image of a nerd.

jessedhillon2• 14 years ago

What's common with all those behaviors he described is that the way they are usually carried, and the predictable "maleness" with which they are chosen, create an air of trying way too hard -- this is something I defintely experience when meeting many programmers. The irony is that the most defining characteristic of authentic masculinity, for most women I know, is the sense that a man believes in hemself and does what feels right for him. Taking up a bunch of stereotypically male activities for the sake of appearing more male is exactly the opposite of that. It's as if the new practitioner looked around and saw what "successful" guys are doing -- dressing well and riding motorcycles -- and decided to copy the outward appearances without understanding why those patterns exist.

cdcarter• 14 years ago

Especially if we are claiming that DHH is dressed well!

philwelch2• 14 years ago

Hey now. Metal music and martial arts are time-honored hobbies for nerds.

jiggy20117• 14 years ago

That's sort of my point. The original nerdy stereotype is somebody with big teeth , a comb-over and a checked shirt tucked into corduroy pants, possibly also a neck beard.

The next generation of nerds distanced themselves from this somewhat by wearing heavy metal T shirts, having long hair and tattoos.

This became uncool too, so now we have the "brogrammer" with designer polo shirts and dark glasses.

It's interesting because nerds are regarded as "uncool" but I find it is quite often they are culturally ahead of the curve.

huggyface• 14 years ago

Is it possible that they weren't trying to shed anything, nor were their interests "compensating"? CS had become one of the most lucrative careers, naturally drawing in a lot of people outside of the traditional (e.g. I entered this field because I loved doing this as a kid, and have loved it since. Many of my peers did their very first line of code in university).

I'm not justifying the "brogrammer" nonsense, but just arguing that it's a field that does more closely represent all parts of demographics, shedding its traditional nerdly people-like-me basis.

itmag• 14 years ago

It also reminds me of the sorts of people who are into PUA manuals.

Care to elaborate? You say it like it's obvious to everyone that being into those manuals is a heinous crime, or at least prima facie evidence of humongous douchebagdom in a person.

GFKjunior• 14 years ago

Here is a pic of the guy who said the line about the girls in the hot tub.

http://danilo.ariadoss.com/about/

Pretty much exactly what I expected.

rmangi• 14 years ago

Nobody who's published an RPG based on Harry Potter can refer to himself as "bro".

jiggy20117• 14 years ago

The hot tub line made me chuckle, they probably thought they were getting invited to cool parties because they were hip.

In actual fact somebody probably wanted them to think this so that they could find a way to raid their wallets.

aValidUserName3• 14 years ago

The only mention of programming on that site is PHP. How surprising!

fruchtose• 14 years ago

One of the links on his site goes to this online game:

http://hogwartslive.wizards.pro/

I hope he does not advertise himself as a UI designer.

cmadan• 14 years ago

Got to love a guy with a blog post about recursively deleting files.

jmduke2• 14 years ago

This isn't high school; there's nothing productive or rational about assigning labels to yourself or others. Judge someone by the quality of their work and the output of their lives, not how they dress or the culture they associate themselves with.

chc• 14 years ago

This sounds nice and everything, but actually, there's a lot that's productive and rational about assigning labels to yourself and others. If you needed to carefully evaluate the sum of every participant's life before every interaction (rather than caching the result of that evaluation in a set of labels), you would be paralyzed. Humans simply don't have the mental capacity to constantly think that deeply about everything. If you tell yourself you don't ever assign labels, at least in your head, you're either deceiving yourself or you're a Buddha.

jmduke2• 14 years ago

Absolutely. But there's a difference between subconsciously creating labels in your head and writing blog posts about subcultures.

icegreentea• 14 years ago

Which conversely means that as long a "brogrammer" isn't negatively effecting the working environment, then you should judge him solely on his work too.

goldmab• 14 years ago

Why are people so angry? It seems like these guys are mostly just acting silly. I don't think it's particularly interesting or funny or whatever, but that's no reason to be mad at them.

Wilya• 14 years ago

I'd be very sad if that loud minority made it so that non-technical people associate "programmer" with the image of a drunk frat boy. That's not going to happen, of course, but I think people judge that this sort of guys give a bad image of the programmers, as a community.

fiblye• 14 years ago

I don't think that these guys will be what give programmers a bad image. If anything, it's the fact that we're completely unwelcoming to anybody who doesn't fit the nerd stereotype in some way. The only exceptions is our openness to all women, and the article's main point was that he doesn't like these guys because they potentially scare off women. Women aren't all delicate little flowers that cry whenever a "brogrammer" is around. Hell, loads of women like these guys, just like loads of guys like "sexy" women who act cold and distant.

Most of those "drunk frat boys" someday grow up and get jobs somewhere. They're always the rare guy that everybody at their workplace hates, so I don't think anybody will ever legitimately associate programmers with party dudes. If anything, we're all lumped together as smug assholes who love to complain about other men's lifestyles.

I don't really care what someone does in their free time. If they can code well and they don't get in the way of my job, then they're fine. If their idea of a good weekend is going to a party with naked women, then I don't care. Claiming they're sexist is putting women on a pedestal, because some women chose to go to a party to meet such guys, and they're going to go back to their workplace and brag about the hot guys they saw at the party.

I'm not even a "brogrammer" by any means, but I hate how much male programmers go out of their way to claim to be morally superior.

monkeygus• 14 years ago

Like the article says, it's really off putting to women programmers. I would never consider applying for a job at a company that was proud of its 'brogramming' culture. We don't need more sexist workplaces.

codeonfire2• 14 years ago

There has always been a problem in STEM jobs where people try to use social manipulation rather than technical achievement to get ahead. With brogrammer, people are trying to convince employers to exclude certain classes of employees such as women or non-social people. Then it becomes a race to the bottom of who fits the stereotype the best rather than rhe most qualified, and technical people end up taking orders from popped-collar types with no technical skills. This is not a joke, and there is a very real reason people are doing this.

bryanh• 14 years ago

Didn't you just describe 90% of regular ole management? Ineptitude certainly isn't exclusively to this particular label.

cop3592• 14 years ago

I think you've got it backwards. There is definitely a degree of pride associated with being nerdy and non-social to the exclusion of "brogrammers".

Try getting a technical job as with a popped collar. Even if you are technically very proficient, there is stigma and distrust from people like the author of the article

drtse42• 14 years ago

The main issue i have with this brogrammer thing is that it's completely idiotic (and just that would be agood reason to be mad at them). It being off putting for women is of secondary importance, imho. It's also quite sad that they allowed that their names (and of their workplace) were published and linked with this kind of statements, c'mon...

Kids these days...

sjtgraham2• 14 years ago

I actually have "Polyglot Brogrammer" as my headline on LinkedIn in the hope that recruiters leave me alone. It hasn't worked.

derleth• 14 years ago

Try "Rockstar Cobol Hacker"; if the recruiters are paying attention, they'll either be unable to find anything that meets the intersection of those sets or they'll have something so interesting it'll be fun to read about even if you don't go with it.

Of course, there's nothing you can do about meat-zombies spamming crap to everyone.

endlessvoid94• 14 years ago

If you're trying to get recruiters to leave you alone, why are you using LinkedIn?

sjtgraham2• 14 years ago

This implies that the only use of LinkedIn is to be courted by recruiters.

eli_gottlieb3• 14 years ago

In an age when prospective employers often want to see your social-network profile, LinkedIn makes an excellent honeypot.

jroseattle• 14 years ago

Pretty sure the entire brogrammer meme was meant tongue-in-cheek, and humor aimed directly at developers. Besides, anyone who might actually carry on in brogrammer style would soon learn the acronym CLM -- career limiting maneuver.

oacgnol• 14 years ago

Agree. I don't see how you could take "brogramming" seriously, it's just a meme. At my company it's a running joke.

That said, if you do happen to meet someone who takes it seriously and lives that "life", then they're dumber than you think they are.

WiseWeasel• 14 years ago

If that was the best social solution they could find, do you really want them near your codebase in any case? : P

iamgilesbowkett2• 14 years ago

I completely agree. It's pretty obviously counterpoint to the usual image of the programmer as nerd. I could see taking it seriously if the OP had said "I met some of these guys and they're as douchey as the article makes them seem" but this completely reeks of recursive trolling. The whole "brogrammer" thing is just a troll at people who think programmers can't have lives, that trolling successfully duped some mainstream media ppl (who probably think "Hacker News" is about the latest on who broke into what and stole passwords from which company), they reported the trolling as fact, and now HN is full of people picking sides.

Notice also how there's like no "brogrammers" in here giving us their side of the story? Almost as if they don't really exist? Or if they do, it's not a life or death to them, like it appears to be to the OP?

Funny to me because I wrote a rant about how Rails was no longer fashionable and Node is more fashionable these days. A few people dissed me for paying attention to tech fashion in the first place, but now HN is all up in arms, ready to break out the pitchforks and torches, over whether or not you wear a polo shirt.

radikalus2• 14 years ago

Yeah, it's an acutely self critical meme.

I might jokingly label myself a "finance douchebag" but it's more a dig at my peers than an affirmation of the industry's behavior patterns.

The culture was becoming frat-house/locker-room long before the term was coined...(Now is there a feedback loop from memes like this, who knows?)

Getting upset over a meme seems kind of pointless. Plus the internets will always win.

Radzell• 14 years ago

I think it was just a way of categorizing the non gaming non- awkward subculture of programmers. I played sports most of my life and i dont play rpg or any game other than sport games with friends. i would say i was the typical developer. Its just a way of identifying men than aren't a typical programmer i would think that women would welcome the change in a very stagnant geeky comp sci culture.

ilamont• 14 years ago

FWIW, only 17 people turned up in a people search for "brogrammer" in LinkedIn:

http://www.linkedin.com/search/fpsearch?type=people&keyw...

That compares with more than 914,000 results for a people search of "programmer"

alexholehouse• 14 years ago

To be honest, I can't think of any bigger red flag on a LinkedIn profile than being a self-declared brogrammer.

MattRogish• 14 years ago

Actually this is awesome. I now know exactly who not to hire. Please, brogrammers unite! You have nothing to lose... except working with me! :)

feedbackloop• 14 years ago

One thing I've always liked about programming is the technical culture of getting things done. What offends me about this 'brogrammer' idea is that it tries to turn programming into yet another fashion.

"We're the cool programmers" is particularly offensive because it alienates people who have been doing work in this area for some time.

I can understand wanting to refine your image but do it without slapping labels on something that belongs to many people, not just you.

jiggy20117• 14 years ago

Perhaps it's a way of asserting some sort of superiority if you discover that you are really just a mediocre programmer.

Like saying "I don't understand haskell but that's cool because I can totally bong a bear unlike you losers"

kellyreid2• 14 years ago

i love bear bonging.

eli_gottlieb3• 14 years ago

But most Real programmers don't understand Haskell either. Every time someone succeeds in understanding Haskell, an alarm rings by SPJ's bed, signaling him to publish another semantic and type-system extension to GHC.

nodemaker• 14 years ago

I proudly call myself a brogrammer (well sometimes at least!) and maybe you should take it easy bro!

strags• 14 years ago

Jeez. How about just being a normal person? Y'know, like the vast majority of programmers out there.

kayoone• 14 years ago

"There's a rising group of developers who are much more sociable and like to go out and have fun, and I think brogramming speaks to that audience," said Gagan Biyani,

Oh my, stereotypes FTW...

cbo• 14 years ago

First, let's be clear that the term "brogrammer", tongue-in-cheek or not, is downright misogynistic.

But equally problematic are the common beliefs that spawned the term in the first place; that programmers must always be obsessed with technology above all else, and to appreciate things like sports, fashion, or fast cars is somehow "bad" or "uncommon" for programmers.

There are a whole host of programmers who despise guys like DHH for enjoying fashion and cars. They seem to believe that somehow, those traits detract from his skill or significance as a programmer. That Rails is a "bad" or "fashionable" framework because of those things and is thus to be avoided. This kind of thinking is just plain ridiculous.

The spectrum on programming ranges from a hobby, to a career, even to the lengths of an obsession. But no one should be expected to act like the "norm". A programmer that cares more about the latest Ferrari than the latest web framework is not necessarily an undesirable programmer. They're just a programmer with different interests, and no one should be treating them differently because of that.

Vergle2• 14 years ago

At the first sentence I was like "..really?" then you were like "DHH ... enjoys fashion" and my head exploded. He dresses like a high school kid.

Aloisius• 14 years ago

We must realize that Ed Hardy under button up shirts two sizes too large is considered fashionable by some people. I've never met them, but I'm sure they exist.

JohnnyBrown• 14 years ago

I've never met anyone who refers to himself as a brogrammer. Pretty much all I know about the term is what I get from it's construction and this article.

I take strong issue with the idea that celebrating masculinity is somehow automatically misogynistic. It seems to me that the term has absolutely nothing to do with women.

hackinthebochs• 14 years ago

>First, let's be clear that the term "brogrammer", tongue-in-cheek or not, is downright misogynistic.

No its not. It's a description of an attitude. When used in a job listing as "looking for brogrammers", then that job listing is sexist. The term itself however is not.

moocow01• 14 years ago

The problem is that it is a trend to the detriment of our profession. You don't have any other half way respectable profession with a sector of it trying to emulate being frat boys. Its embarrassing really.

Its a surprising slice of programming culture in that most who get into programming tend to be the polar opposite of frat boys. Maybe this is a side effect of The Social Network movie.

jfoutz• 14 years ago

Finance.

Vergle2• 14 years ago

".. bro! Keep your fucking work life balance." ... "This is wall street bitch you don't belong here!" ... "Damn it feels good to be a banker!"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ROlDmux7Tk4

brown9-2• 14 years ago

"Want to bro down and crush code? Klout is hiring."

Honestly, who does this type of recruiting really appeal to? Phrases like "crush code" have about as much of a cringe-factor to me as "wanted: code ninja".

arihant• 14 years ago

Its not a non-female concept as the author misunderstands. Its called Proglamming.

Its called free choice. To each its own; don't nag somebody's way of life and correlate it to their talent. Don't hate what you do not understand.

Brogramming is state of mind. If you let yourself immerse in it, you will see.

FreshCode2• 14 years ago

I call Poe's Law :). I have had so much fun with the brogrammer stereotype - developer jocks do exist and are quite common. We considered changing the name of our local developer meetup group from "Nerdy Food Meetups" to something "cooler" like Hungry Hackers, but we decided against it, lest the name prove too inviting for brogrammers. So far: success. The group has been 100% self-selective for nerds.

briandear• 14 years ago

Kind of interesting.. excluding people not based on their qualifications (or ability to contribute), but based on their willingness to self-identify as a nerd. Doesn't seem very welcoming..

FreshCode2• 14 years ago

How is it different from excluding (bro)grammers based on their unwillingness to self-identity as a nerd, despite their qualifications?

wisty• 14 years ago

The problem with "bro" culture is its narcissistic conformism. I guess they are really looking for an excuse to behave badly. They know they are being assholes, so they manufacture a social environment in which they are encouraged to be assholes.

So listen, bros:

If you want to get drunk, and hit on chicks, that's your choice. But don't give in to peer pressure, and don't pressure your mates. Just be yourself.

vicapow• 14 years ago

what if women (concisely or subconsciously) find the bro sexually attractive. Could one of the reasons more women don't enter computer science be because of the perception of "slim social pickings?" I'm not suggesting I personally agree with the "bro" ideology but it's fair to consider those that do not choose to enter computer science (male or female) make that choice for reasons motivated by mate selection.

gruseom• 14 years ago

This is a toxic side-effect of a healthy thing: the rise in status of programming work.

In the dotcom boom, douchebags didn't program, they did MBAs and took for granted that as "business guys" they would have the lion's share of wealth and status just for being who they were. That many of them now feel compelled to join the profession their forebears saw as underlings and learn to actually do real work, while many of the rest are pleading for technical cofounders, are signs of a major shift.

Remember that video that did the rounds on HN a year or two ago about the Valley in the 70s? A typical technical cofounder would end up with 2% ownership and zero control. Compare that to Mark Zuckerberg retaining control of Facebook and extolling "the hacker way" in an SEC filing. It's a massive change in the right direction, and most of it has happened in the last 15 years and it's still accelerating. It will be interesting to see the social consequences. Annoying epiphenomena like "brogrammers" are inevitable, but deeper changes are the ones to watch for.

cantbecool• 14 years ago

brogrammers are just programmers that are irreverent. That's it. Nothing to get up in arms about.

olalonde• 14 years ago

I can see why a lot of people seem to dislike this particular stereotype, but I'd like to remind them they are equally falling prey to stereotypical discrimination when they are looking to hire "geeks" or "nerds". My main OS is Ubuntu, I'm comfortable with half a dozen programming languages, my editor of choice is Vim, I built a Linux distribution for fun, I just wrote a K-means algorithm implementation in Javascript, for fun... Yet, I don't feel I'm either a geek or a nerd. I don't like video games, RPGs, I'm not awkward/shy, I don't particularly care about mangas, anime or whatever makes a geek a geek or a nerd a nerd. To be honest, I don't know why people would want to be associated with two terms that carry heavy negative connotation (according to my own experience and Wikipedia). Perhaps, I am misunderstanding the meaning of those words but does it really matter? Unless, I'm part of a tiny minority, what's the point of using words that are vastly misunderstood? While "geek" and "nerd" are arguably less harmful than "brogrammer", I just wish people would stop using such labels altogether.

k-mcgrady• 14 years ago

I don't think people are saying that programmers should conform to the geek/nerd stereotype. I think the issue is that some programmers are actively trying to conform to the 'bro' stereotype. They seem to think this makes them 'cool' when the 'bro' stereotype is mainly used in a derogatory manner. You should really just be yourself and do good work.

eli_gottlieb3• 14 years ago

It's a spectrum. I'm a complete stereotypical "geek" who aspires to enter academic research, and yet the #1 thing I want to do this week is go to a punk rock concert. The thing that kept me going through a period of depression this fall was attending Occupy Boston.

Nobody is just one thing. I don't understand why America as a whole has such a trouble with this concept, in school and then in the working world too (look at "professionalism" and "dedication" from the eyes of someone who has more than one personal facet than their job).

cop3592• 14 years ago

As someone who actually has bro friends the author has no idea what he's talking about. He's completely misrepresenting bros and is regurgitating stereotypes.

First he gets all pissy about stereotyping nerds as having pocket-protectors and then in the next sentence regurgitates his one dimensional view on what "frat-house culture" is and bros' attitudes towards women.

phwd• 14 years ago

There are two things that needs to be defined here (Well three if you include how media never portrays the story as it was interviewed, media always searches for the dramatical pitch [1])

The first is that of the Brogramming meme. The definition at Urban Dictionary is a joke in itself. It's a joke accept it, don't accept it. No developer in their right mind goes around proclaiming that they are a brogrammer and if they are saying that they are serious (like some say in the case of Facebook and Zynga) you are being deceived [2].

There is a second definition which that I think everyone clumps with this meme and that is of the asshole/douchebag/sexist employee. He is everywhere. Not just in software development. These individuals are the ones making the majority of sexist comments, makes sexist jokes while a female employee is in a cubicle nearby, trying to hit on female coworkers during work hours and going to bars every night. They have existed long before any reference to Brogramming.

Now, I will say this. It was not smart of this individual to try advertise the meme to the SfGate readership. Just based on the prefix "bro" alone will bring about perception of sexism even if the original intent was not to be.

[1] http://www.facebook.com/ariadoss/posts/305742279480205 [2]: http://www.facebook.com/getwiththebrogram/posts/373108606051...

sad_panda• 14 years ago

When tech stops being as lucrative, the brogrammers will scatter like cockroaches.

mykolasmith• 14 years ago

The fact that anyone is talking about any of this speaks volumes about how skewed some people's priorities are. The author of this article comes across as a whiny bitch, and the author of the article in question comes across as a douche-bag. Can we get back to discussing meaningful topics?

JVIDEL• 14 years ago

Yes we're all nerds carrying around TI89s on our belts, and still coding in FORTRAN...

I find this image of regular programmers nearly as offensive as the faux geek imagine hipsters try to acquire while wearing cheap prescription glasses they don't need.

kellyreid2• 14 years ago

maybe "brogrammers" are just bros first, programmers second. i know plenty of guys who were "bros" that are now developers. why can't you people just let them be who they want to be and live their life?

i'm pretty sure the guy in the hot tub full of women is getting very upset with the trash people are talking about him on the internet. i'm sure he's taking time away from watching football and drinking natty lite to pen a witty response.

how about you all stop clinging to a false sense of identity , live, and let live?

polygrammer• 14 years ago

Some of the people in this thread need to think carefully about why it is they think what they do about some of these issues. Lumping all women together into an anti-sexually free, prudish bunch is horribly insulting.

If you want to attack "brogrammers" because their attitude annoys you, or you don't like their style (which I completely agree with. I personally find the style completely obnoxious) that's one thing. Those of you attacking them because they like sex, women, porn, naked parties, etc. - please stop to think about who and what you are painting with that wide, wide brush. I can assure you that the women I know in the BDSM, poly, swinger, sex club, goth/industrial, alt porn and other largely sex-positive communities would be offended not only by your generalizations that women do not like these things, but offended /at your offense./ Additionally, many of those women are not only in those communities, but some of them happen to be systems admins, developers, and hold other technical positions.

Please do not conflate "prudish people" with "women." The above mentioned communities will thank you.

Call yourself a 'brogrammer'? Then get the hell away from me.

Related Stories