Tell them, my song.

This is a response to a post on the BlitzMax programmers forum where somebody wondered about the old stereotype that programmers tend to grow their hair long. Since I’ve verbally talked about this topic so often in the past that it got tiresome, I thought I finally write about it here.

If you want to know why males grow long hair, study some history. In the past, long hair was a status symbol for Freedom – it separated aristocrats from peons. Although this has mostly been forgotten, it is still a motivation to let your hair grow long: For reasons unknown, everybody seems to believe nowadays that males have to wear short hair, and that in turn is reason enough to have long hair that separates you from the masses who do not even know why they cut it (except for: Everybody does it, so it has to be the right thing).

Now programmers usually do not shine with their social skills – this forum is an excellent reference and example for it. But they usually have the intellectual capacity to understand many fundamental aspects of the society they live in, and since programmers are in the business of creating and changing things, they want to demonstrate that they do not belong to the class of peons who are just doing what they’re being told by the now suit-wearing self-proclaimed aristocrats.

We do not wear suits and ties but we wear long hair because we are free thinkers who do not bend to the rules of society.

It’s something we have in common with Heavy Metal dudes and it explains why we usually also love Metal so much.

Rock hard. Ride free.

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