The absolute worst thing about how STEM is taught in my country is how entirely devoid curriculums are from critical theory. You take inputs, outputs, energies and production as-is, and you get a crop of drones who think such discussions are irrelevant. Then they graduate, start working and earning good money -- and suddenly they support capitalist production structures because they're "rational" and "objective". Some then become the biggest chuds ever known to man.

I remember that I discussed gentrification with a civil engineer who happened to be my boss, a very renowned and talented person in our branch. He didn't know what gentrification was...

Republicans have never forgiven Alan Turing, and much prefer the contributions of IBM during the same period.

If it's science, it's woke!
Real patriots use the abacus.

I feel like this isn't super new. You haven't been able to do things like talk academically about network security or cryptography without being incredibly critical of government for decades.

My professors sure were. I felt really bad for them, honestly. They were the driving force to make philosophy and ethics courses mandatory at my university in order to recieve a comp sci degree.

"If you work in these areas long enough, at a high enough level, you WILL be asked to compromise something for the benefit of a state actor, and you might not even realize it's happening. The person asking you to do it might not even realize what is really happening." Was what our prof told a packed lecture hall.

It's an introduction class, just start with history of computers and shift to programming from there.

You know, the history of computers, the Alan Turing, and the first assembly language, and the first software engineer, and "the entire pre-1992 internet."

I'm sure these topics become relevant at some point, but I'm doubtful that it's absolutely necessary to address them in an intro course. how does leftist ideology help kids understand what a while loop does

like, literacy can do all of these things too, that doesn't mean you have to introduce those concepts at the same time as the abc's

I don't think OP is implying while loops require ideological understandings, but rather more foundationally as to understand how computer commodities are made and traded, the concept of centralization simply arises. Thus, the discussion of control, IP, etc, and now AI and labor.

I genuinely used to believe this too, but the CCC opened my eyes to anarchism, and then HN opened my eyes to plutarchism.

I iterate now between several modes of: "GPLv3 is the best license humanity can use to better itself, decentralised projects are mandatory to keep authoritarian regimes at bay, but damn do I love using MIT projects in my hobby code projects, and hmm it would be nice to make some side income with said hobby project...."

Each of these contradictions of the other, which bothered me in my late 20s, but now I think it's relatively normal to inhabit several conflicting ideals at once

I guess it is just a matter of time before the Trump regime designates logic as hardcore leftist ideology

I've seen a world where access to knowledge and power is paywalled. And I've seen the one where that freedom is a granted right. I know which one I picked, and it's because SO HELP ME, IF I CAN'T FIX IT MYSELF, I WILL BREAK IT MYSELF!

I can't help but broadly agree, computing is the new de facto means of production. It is inherently political.

(please please please be my prof next semester...)

"...because when we go online, we free ourselves from consumerism, racism, and get to express ourselves however we want without it getting back to our school or employer."

Honest Trailers may have gone downhill from thier peak, but Hackers (and the OG Dune) videos gave great lines worth sharing