Python Is a Bad Programming Language

Whitespace is definitely a legitimate critique of python.

The fact that people have learned to live with it or just ignore it is pretty irrelevant in my opinion.

Significant whitespace means I can't copy+paste without introducing bugs or breaking the code. It means code formatting becomes more complex to automate. It's seriously the dumbest language feature to defend and should be pretty acceptable to admit was a mistake.

I agree that having whitespace sensitive scoping isn't a compelling enough reason in itself to avoid python, but it is hard for me to understand how python programmers insist on defending it as a great design choice that "improves readability". To me that indicates an inexperienced developer who is unfamiliar with the alternatives.

I feel similarly for people who reject (or say they hate) static types and compilers.

> It means code formatting becomes more complex to automate

No, it means it is both simpler to automate and less necessary, because syntactically correct code is already largely formatted.

tl;dr "I don't like python because it doesn't have the features I personally like"

If you find a language you like better than Python, cool, use that language. In the meantime, don't post rants posing as objective critiques, that's just a waste of everyone's time.

none of those things are dumb, but I agree that they are minor

AMEN. You can write terrible code in any programming language. I know because I’ve done it. You can write kickass code in any* programming language. I know because I’ve done it.

Language elitism is a useful metric in that it can serve to indicate an inexperienced and/or arrogant developer. I used to do this when I was younger and less experienced, but when you really start seeing the larger world and all the stuff out there, good and bad, you start to realize the language is almost never the problem. It’s nearly always your own ignorance. And that should humble you enough to realize that doing things in a different way than your preference isn’t necessarily bad or wrong, and there’s almost always context behind bad code you’re unaware of (usually business/political pressures). Under the same circumstances, you’d probably make similar mistakes and trade offs - maybe even worse.

Humility is the gateway to knowledge.

* Except brainfuck. The name tells you all you need to know.