this post was submitted on 23 Mar 2024
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The first part of this article is taking about naming, and then heavily implies “CSS/HTML is not a programming language” is equivalent to devaluing front end developers. But that’s not the case, at least not for me.
Front end is hard. It is obnoxiously hard and requires both artistry and technical skill. And it’s critical to the success of anything that has a front end.
But I still say, “CSS/HTML is not a programming language”, because they’re not Turing complete. A programming language is something you can write a program in, without any other languages. It’s a matter of definition, not a matter of valuation. CSS and HTML are difficult and critical to get right but they’re a different kind of thing from programming languages.
And semantically, logically, you are 100% correct. But there are other, subjective, emotional, layers to language. Billionaire, business magnate, and oligarch can mean the exact same thing, but they have very different emotional meanings and associated contexts.
I think the author may have a point that by spreading the "HTML is not a programming language" meme, we may be contributing to its lower subjective status.
But this thesis is, by its very nature, subjective, of course.
To me that ‘meme’ is like someone making an “Eggs aren’t meat” meme. Technically correct, I agree with the factual part of the statement, but the meme is dumb and pointless, like a bad joke. Unless the point is to belittle, in which case the poster deserves to be forced to do front end dev and deal with irrational user complaints until they repent or end up huddled in a corner mumbling incoherently, either or.
It’s like sexism. I don’t have time for that shit. If people were being sexist, bigoted, or belittling frontend devs at my job I’d tell them to get their heads out of their asses, or find a new job and then tell them. Fortunately I currently work with people who don’t suck.