I think the point of the manifesto is reject the continuous raising of the bar that enthusiastic programmers bring to the community. An accountant doesn't need to compete with someone who is passionate about accountanting on the side. Neither does a welder, a shopkeep, or a factory. These people just want to put in 8 and forget about it. They don't want to put in effort to update their skills, they don't want to learn a new framework, they want to do the least outside of work they they can and still collect a paycheque.
On one hand I worked at a place where no one had learned how to use Java generics since they had been on 1.4 until recently, and they never saw the need to learn (this was a couple of months ago). On the other hand if I was only an accountant since it offered the best prospects for my family I'd probably want to be reminded of it as little as possible.
This is such bullshit reasoning. I have a family member who is a very successful welder that is continuously working to improve his craft. This is the reason why people in the tech community seem smug to outsiders.
I actually didn't know that welding was something with varying degrees of skill. That wasn't said out of condescension but rather ignorance. I guess "cashier" would have been a better example. There are people who want to work like cashier but get paid middle class incomes. They are "middle class cashiers & stock boys".
Middle class cashiers and clerks used to exist until reading and writing became ubiquitous, and computers took much of the effort out of keeping track of numbers and data processing.
On one hand I worked at a place where no one had learned how to use Java generics since they had been on 1.4 until recently, and they never saw the need to learn (this was a couple of months ago). On the other hand if I was only an accountant since it offered the best prospects for my family I'd probably want to be reminded of it as little as possible.