Why I Hate Macs (or How Schooling Can Kill the Passion for Learning)

When I took my current job, I thought they used PC computers. Well, they do to a small degree but the main network is Apple Macintosh. Today we installed the OS 10 operating system on our Macs.

I hate Apple computers. This stems back to my days from a computer programming class in high school.

Back in 1980 or 1981, the high school I attended had a small number of Apple computers and a few elementary computer programming classes. The computers were those primitive 64k Macs. I was stuck in one of those classes with a roomful of fellow classmates eager to dazzle everyone with their supposed intelligence. There is nothing like a computer programming class to bring out the asshole in someone. My high school programming teacher, Sarah Baker, was a middle-aged, unattractive bitch with no sense of humor.

I couldn't even find solace in the course material. It was run like a military boot camp. "Type in 'x=0,return key, x=x+2'" This is no way for someone to learn the art of computer programming. I hated everything in that awful class. It killed my interest in computers for about ten years.

I did have one good experience. The computers were set up as a lab and there was no assigned seating. At the end of the class, we had to log off of our computers. Well, one day I typed in a message and left the monitor on. I did this on purpose. I wrote "Fuck you, Mrs. Baker." She went nuts! You would have thought it was the Columbine shooting. She didn't know who wrote it. From that day onward, there was assigned seating.

My only regret is that damn class killed my interest in computer applications for almost ten years. It wasn't until 1989 when I got started while working at my cousin's drapery business in Michigan. I would have been much better off by not having taken the programming class in high school.

To this day I am biased against Macs for this very reason. I will always associate them with that horrible class.