[FatalError]

And even if they were, surely this is only a bad thing in that it might indicate that some potentially good engineers had been excluded from the workforce.

Is reverse-bigotry really so far gone that some people genuinely think that being an "antisocial 20-something" makes a person a worse engineer?

[dagw]

One of the key factors in becoming a good engineer is experience. a 20-something, antisocial or otherwise, basically by definition is lacking in this experience. Sure they may be really really smart and write incredibly clever code, but it takes more than that to be a good engineer.