I want to do a quick video here. Just want to tell you about why you should avoid politics in programming if you’re a software developer.
This is really important. It’s kind of a public service announcement to you guys.
And in this video, I’m going to say here is some pragmatic advice. Begin in pragmatism, end in pragmatism. #rulesprogrammersmustfollow #selftaughtprogrammer #thinklikeaprogrammer
John Sonmez: So, I want to do a quick video here. Just want to tell you about why you should avoid politics in programming if you’re a software developer. It’s really important. It’s kind of a public service announcement to you guys, but what I’m going to say here is some pragmatic advice. Begin in pragmatism, end in pragmatism.
If you guys are just joining me for the first time, I’m John from simpleprogrammer.com. On this channel, I teach you the soft skills that you need to know as a software developer. I also have the book called The Complete Software Developer Career Guide. It fluctuates between being number four and number one on Amazon. Let’s boost it back up there to number one. If you haven’t checked it out, believe me, this is going to be one of the best purchases you make as a programmer. I firmly believe that. And I’m not… That’s my story and I’m sticking to it. So anyway, what we’re going to talk about today is avoiding politics. Again, you may have seen that I got canceled last year, about a year ago and it did hurt me financially. I’ll tell you. One of my books, my other book got unpublished by the publisher.
But I got the rights to it so I’m going to republish it, which will actually be good for me financially. But I did get a bunch of courses removed from a company called Pluralsight. Used to really like that company, but eh. When the going gets tough, just throw someone under the bus. So I got thrown under the bus. It’s cool though. It’s fine. I get it. But it’s a good example of what can happen to you if you are looking from a political viewpoint as a programmer. Now again, do I believe in free speech? Do I believe in what I said? Am I against all of the bullshit that’s happening in the space right now? Of course, of course I am. You know who I am right? But at the same time, if you go the other way, right, and you are supporting all of these initiatives and these code of conducts and these diversity programs and all that stuff, you might even believe it.
I don’t care if you believe that, so that’s fine. But if you become a social justice warrior as well, there’s also going to be negative implications. Whichever side that you’re falling on, there’s going to be a negative implications for you because, heck, if I’m an employer and I’m looking on Twitter and I see that you are rousing up trouble because you are fighting the good fight of being a social justice warrior and calling people out and canceling people, I don’t really want to hire you either. I’m going to pretend to be politically correct and all these things. But when you come in for the job interview and I’m looking at your Twitter and I’m like, “Shit, is this person going to start some problems here at the company? Are they going to try to claim harassment suits or unfair hiring practices or whatever discrimination. And are they going to be on Twitter all day trying to cancel people?”
I’m going to pretend like I’m all on board with your cause. But then they, “I’m not going to hire you because I don’t want that trouble in my company,” right. I’m not going to tell you that. I’m not going to tell anyone that, all right. You’re just going to think that you’re being discriminated against or that you didn’t get the job, but that’s going to be the reason why you didn’t get the job. The same thing’s going to happen on the other side, right?
If you are very much politically active as a programmer, okay, in your career and you’re supporting the other side of the fence, you’re going to run into… in the tech field there’s a lot of people that are on the left side of things. Okay. And they are not going to like you at all. They’re going to hate your guts. Okay. And so they’re definitely not going to hire you there. They’ll tell you why. They’ll tell you why. They’ll say that you’re a racist, sexist asshole, but you’re still not going to get the job. So now it might sound weird, again, for me to be saying this, being the guy who literally got canceled, who says whatever the fuck he wants, okay on YouTube or on my blog and in my books, but I’m telling you this because I believe in pragmatism. What’s pragmatic for me is not what’s pragmatic for you. What’s pragmatic for me is to say what I want, okay? And that there’re certain people that like that are going to be attracted to me and understand that I’m giving them the truth. And also I’m in a different position, right?
Financially I’m in a pretty secure position. And I have a bunch of passive income coming in. I’ve got a couple of businesses. I don’t rely on someone else, but if you’re not in that position, it doesn’t really make sense. As much as I’d love your support, okay, I don’t want you to make the bad choice of fighting the good fight when it’s not pragmatically the thing that you should be doing for you for your career. Again, same thing. If you have that social justice inclination, that’s cool. That’s fine. I don’t like it. All right. I’ve expressed my views on that. But if you decide to express it, it’s going to hurt you as well. So what should you do as a programmer? You should focus on programming and really one of the main reasons why I’m making this video is because I’ve gotten frustrated with the tech industry because it’s become a political place.
It shouldn’t be. It should be a meritocracy. It should be about what your skills are. Okay. That’s what we should be looking at. We shouldn’t look at what gender, what race someone is. We shouldn’t look at what political viewpoint someone has or what sexual identity they have. None of that stuff matters. What matters is, how good do you write code? How good of an employee are you? How good of a worker are you? How trustworthy are you in doing your job? How competent are you? Those are the things that should matter, okay? And that’s the thing that you should focus on. You can get wrapped up into all this bullshit and believe me, you can. It’s easy to get sucked into that stuff, but, but do you really want to? It’s going to make your life miserable. You’re always going to be angry, okay, whichever side that you fall on.
Instead, just put your head down, do your work and collect your paycheck and help people along the way. If you do that, you’re going to be way more successful. If you get involved in the political bullshit, it’s going to waste a bunch of your time, it’s going to make you look bad. It’s never going to be a good thing for you. And it’s just not the pragmatic thing to do. Now, if you get fuck you money like me and you want to speak your mind, go ahead. But just remember this. If you don’t have financial independence, you don’t have freedom of speech anymore. That’s how society is today.
So anyway, if you want to support me, go ahead and subscribe to the channel, buy the book, check out simpleprogrammer.com and buy some of the courses there. I’ve got a course on how to market yourself as a software developer. One on how to learn things quickly, and then a real estate investing course. And there’s a couple other things out there. Free course on how to create a blog to boost your career if you want to start getting into the world of building a business and… all right. That’s it guys. I’ll see you next time.
I want to do a quick video here. Just want to tell you about why you should avoid politics in programming if you’re a software developer.
This is really important. It’s kind of a public service announcement to you guys.
And in this video, I’m going to say here is some pragmatic advice. Begin in pragmatism, end in pragmatism. #rulesprogrammersmustfollow #selftaughtprogrammer #thinklikeaprogrammer
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Transcript Of The Video
John Sonmez: So, I want to do a quick video here. Just want to tell you about why you should avoid politics in programming if you’re a software developer. It’s really important. It’s kind of a public service announcement to you guys, but what I’m going to say here is some pragmatic advice. Begin in pragmatism, end in pragmatism.
If you guys are just joining me for the first time, I’m John from simpleprogrammer.com. On this channel, I teach you the soft skills that you need to know as a software developer. I also have the book called The Complete Software Developer Career Guide. It fluctuates between being number four and number one on Amazon. Let’s boost it back up there to number one. If you haven’t checked it out, believe me, this is going to be one of the best purchases you make as a programmer. I firmly believe that. And I’m not… That’s my story and I’m sticking to it. So anyway, what we’re going to talk about today is avoiding politics. Again, you may have seen that I got canceled last year, about a year ago and it did hurt me financially. I’ll tell you. One of my books, my other book got unpublished by the publisher.
But I got the rights to it so I’m going to republish it, which will actually be good for me financially. But I did get a bunch of courses removed from a company called Pluralsight. Used to really like that company, but eh. When the going gets tough, just throw someone under the bus. So I got thrown under the bus. It’s cool though. It’s fine. I get it. But it’s a good example of what can happen to you if you are looking from a political viewpoint as a programmer. Now again, do I believe in free speech? Do I believe in what I said? Am I against all of the bullshit that’s happening in the space right now? Of course, of course I am. You know who I am right? But at the same time, if you go the other way, right, and you are supporting all of these initiatives and these code of conducts and these diversity programs and all that stuff, you might even believe it.
I don’t care if you believe that, so that’s fine. But if you become a social justice warrior as well, there’s also going to be negative implications. Whichever side that you’re falling on, there’s going to be a negative implications for you because, heck, if I’m an employer and I’m looking on Twitter and I see that you are rousing up trouble because you are fighting the good fight of being a social justice warrior and calling people out and canceling people, I don’t really want to hire you either. I’m going to pretend to be politically correct and all these things. But when you come in for the job interview and I’m looking at your Twitter and I’m like, “Shit, is this person going to start some problems here at the company? Are they going to try to claim harassment suits or unfair hiring practices or whatever discrimination. And are they going to be on Twitter all day trying to cancel people?”
I’m going to pretend like I’m all on board with your cause. But then they, “I’m not going to hire you because I don’t want that trouble in my company,” right. I’m not going to tell you that. I’m not going to tell anyone that, all right. You’re just going to think that you’re being discriminated against or that you didn’t get the job, but that’s going to be the reason why you didn’t get the job. The same thing’s going to happen on the other side, right?
If you are very much politically active as a programmer, okay, in your career and you’re supporting the other side of the fence, you’re going to run into… in the tech field there’s a lot of people that are on the left side of things. Okay. And they are not going to like you at all. They’re going to hate your guts. Okay. And so they’re definitely not going to hire you there. They’ll tell you why. They’ll tell you why. They’ll say that you’re a racist, sexist asshole, but you’re still not going to get the job. So now it might sound weird, again, for me to be saying this, being the guy who literally got canceled, who says whatever the fuck he wants, okay on YouTube or on my blog and in my books, but I’m telling you this because I believe in pragmatism. What’s pragmatic for me is not what’s pragmatic for you. What’s pragmatic for me is to say what I want, okay? And that there’re certain people that like that are going to be attracted to me and understand that I’m giving them the truth. And also I’m in a different position, right?
Financially I’m in a pretty secure position. And I have a bunch of passive income coming in. I’ve got a couple of businesses. I don’t rely on someone else, but if you’re not in that position, it doesn’t really make sense. As much as I’d love your support, okay, I don’t want you to make the bad choice of fighting the good fight when it’s not pragmatically the thing that you should be doing for you for your career. Again, same thing. If you have that social justice inclination, that’s cool. That’s fine. I don’t like it. All right. I’ve expressed my views on that. But if you decide to express it, it’s going to hurt you as well. So what should you do as a programmer? You should focus on programming and really one of the main reasons why I’m making this video is because I’ve gotten frustrated with the tech industry because it’s become a political place.
It shouldn’t be. It should be a meritocracy. It should be about what your skills are. Okay. That’s what we should be looking at. We shouldn’t look at what gender, what race someone is. We shouldn’t look at what political viewpoint someone has or what sexual identity they have. None of that stuff matters. What matters is, how good do you write code? How good of an employee are you? How good of a worker are you? How trustworthy are you in doing your job? How competent are you? Those are the things that should matter, okay? And that’s the thing that you should focus on. You can get wrapped up into all this bullshit and believe me, you can. It’s easy to get sucked into that stuff, but, but do you really want to? It’s going to make your life miserable. You’re always going to be angry, okay, whichever side that you fall on.
Instead, just put your head down, do your work and collect your paycheck and help people along the way. If you do that, you’re going to be way more successful. If you get involved in the political bullshit, it’s going to waste a bunch of your time, it’s going to make you look bad. It’s never going to be a good thing for you. And it’s just not the pragmatic thing to do. Now, if you get fuck you money like me and you want to speak your mind, go ahead. But just remember this. If you don’t have financial independence, you don’t have freedom of speech anymore. That’s how society is today.
So anyway, if you want to support me, go ahead and subscribe to the channel, buy the book, check out simpleprogrammer.com and buy some of the courses there. I’ve got a course on how to market yourself as a software developer. One on how to learn things quickly, and then a real estate investing course. And there’s a couple other things out there. Free course on how to create a blog to boost your career if you want to start getting into the world of building a business and… all right. That’s it guys. I’ll see you next time.