There is an important way in which writing C (or really any language where you allocate memory manually) is not like driving a stick.
The thing about driving a stick shift is, when you make a mistake, you know it immediately: you hear gears grinding, or see the tach leap up because you downshifted too far, or start rolling backwards downhill. The car gives you instant feedback on your performance as a driver. You learn from this feedback and become a better driver. You know you're a better driver because the bad feedback doesn't happen anymore.
Making a mistake when programming in a language where you manage memory manually is frequently not like this; you don't get the instant feedback when you screw up. The code compiles, the binary runs, everything looks fine. It's only days or weeks or months or years later that you realize that, while it looked fine, it has actually been slowly leaking memory, or in certain circumstances can lead to a buffer overflow, or so forth. Maybe you never realize it. So, without the prod of that instant feedback, you don't become a better programmer. You just keep writing crappy, broken C forever.
The thing about driving a stick shift is, when you make a mistake, you know it immediately: you hear gears grinding, or see the tach leap up because you downshifted too far, or start rolling backwards downhill. The car gives you instant feedback on your performance as a driver. You learn from this feedback and become a better driver. You know you're a better driver because the bad feedback doesn't happen anymore.
Making a mistake when programming in a language where you manage memory manually is frequently not like this; you don't get the instant feedback when you screw up. The code compiles, the binary runs, everything looks fine. It's only days or weeks or months or years later that you realize that, while it looked fine, it has actually been slowly leaking memory, or in certain circumstances can lead to a buffer overflow, or so forth. Maybe you never realize it. So, without the prod of that instant feedback, you don't become a better programmer. You just keep writing crappy, broken C forever.