[astrange]

If it helps, they can't possibly be as toxic as Lisp programmers used to be, where more or less any online conversation would start with someone new asking a question and Erik Naggum replying that they were a moron who should die.

[kazinator]

Why is it that, say, C programmers, as such, don't get painted according to what has historically gone on in the comp.lang.c newsgroup?

[astrange]

Probably because there's so many more of them. Maybe because being called not a real UNIX programmer feels different from being called a Blub programmer.

[kazinator]

Maybe I should ask: why should someone interested about Lisp today have to hear stories about some Erik Naggum who posted to a Usenet newsgroup, and died 15 years ago?

Let's assume that the newsgroup is important. Legendary Lisp hacker Alan Bawden posted there just last week or so. Nobody ever mentions him.

[astrange]

Every other one I've met in my life was nearly as unpleasant. Fewer death threats but they clearly all thought they had 200 more IQ points than you because they could write a macro. Thus the term "Lisp weenie".

In this case I think people should learn from history and that specific examples are the best way to do that. It's, like, effective pedagogy or whatever.

Supposedly Clojure people are nice though.

[kazinator]

On the flip side, if you reveal to people that you are involved in Lisp, the experiences are varied.

All too often you get ignorant remarks, jokes about parentheses or "contents of address register", or outright ridicule.

If you say anything frank at that point, chances are good you might come off as an asshole.

Just smile, nod your head, change the subject, and never return to it.

[lispm]

"toxic" is also to generalize from one person / one forum, to an extremely diverse group, many which never used Usenet

[cogman10]

Lol, I had a similar example with perl as a young teen programmer.

They've gotten way nicer.