TOXIC RANT INCOMING!
I don't know who needs to hear this but I'm going to say it loud and clear: BEING A FANBOY DOES NOT MAKE YOU COOL OR SMART. God fucking damn, I am so tired of the amount of vitriol, cynicism, and catty petulant snide comments coming from smoothbrains on the Internet.
I know, I know - OS wars have always been a thing, they are literally older than the Internet. People would legitimately spent money to dial into a BBS and tell other people their computer was shit because it wasn't set up exactly like theirs was.
I've never really had a taste for this sort of shit, but in recent years it's been really getting on my nerves. Maybe I'm too online, or maybe I'm getting old. But I just have to say it. Being a fanboy of a certain OS or software means, almost unquestionably, that you are a fucking idiot.
This all coming from someone who generally prefers macOS and uses a Mac for both work and home: Mac fanboys have to be the most insufferable of them all. True Mac fanboys are rare on the kinds of Internet crevices I dwell in, but they are always the most smug and delusional of the trifecta, walking manifestations of the Dunning-Kruger effect. macOS has always been the black sheep, always been controversial, and it's always been obvious to the most casual observer why that is: Macs are expensive, they are different than PCs (which have 90% marketshare) in sometimes strange and confusing ways, and macOS is genuinely limiting in certain capacities. But somehow, for a diehard contingent of Apple fans, this isn't obvious!
My previous M1 Macbook Air was a powerhouse of a machine, a huge upgrade from my old laptop. It had an 8-core top-of-the-line integrated GPU inside its special, special M1 processor. And it could, through intentional hardware and software limitations, only drive one external monitor at a time. Not only that, the resolution and refresh rate of the external monitor was fucked up! When I found out about this, I was flabbergasted and complained online. Some fucker responded to me and told me that "The Air isn't a pro device, it can't be expected to do strenuous things like drive multiple external monitors. That's serious work for professionals. And Apple can't be expected to test compatibility with monitors for poor people. You should have bought a Macbook Pro with official Apple monitors and not complained."
Really, what an insufferable cretin. What a completely smug and delusional understanding of value and why people buy things. What a complete and total lack of understanding about how laptops and displays work. Keep bootlicking a trillion-dollar company, you mentally stunted fuck!
(I actually did end up trading it in for a Macbook Pro M3 just so I could drive more monitors, and to this day I still wonder if that constitutes as Stockholm Syndrome, but oh well.)
Linux fanboy posts always make me want to take a shower. They are detached from reality in the same way as Apple fans, except they live in their mom's basement and comb mites out of their crusty beards.
You thought the "hardware for poor people" comment was bad? Multiple Linux fans have told me that all my Linux problems originate from my use of NVIDIA graphics cards, and that if I had just not bought NVIDIA that Linux gaming would work fine. In fact, they have told me I deserved my problems for buying a graphics card from a company that is "actively hostile to Linux developers".
Well, what if you have the right graphics card, but you want to play a game not supported by Proton? That game sucked anyways, a real Linux user wouldn't play it. Oh, now you're seeing bugs in your window manager? Well, that's because you shouldn't be using a window manager anyways, you mouth-breathing troglodyte. Everyone knows real Linux users do everything in dwm and st with no color theme.
If you can't navigate the numerous UI inconsistencies, usability problems, system instability, strange package manager quirks, or billions of other problems with desktop Linux, there are only three possibilities:
- You are using the software wrong,
- You are using the hardware wrong, or (in case of emergency):
- You are too stupid to use Linux, unlike me, a true computer wizard.
It is completely inconceivable to Linux fanboys that people might want to use a computer differently than how they do. You can actually hear the gears in their head grinding and popping as they contemplate hideous normie ideas such as installing software by clicking on it or using the Adobe Creative Suite or a GUI file manager that works.
Linux is a religious cult to them, they are so used to everything being free and garbage that anything non-free or non-garbage is apostasy.
I don't even know who Windows fanboys are.
That OS is so shit people barely even bother to defend it, but every once in a while you will see someone randomly asserting that Windows is the best OS and that people using anything else is a $INSERT_SLUR_HERE.
(No seriously, I've noticed that Windows fanboys have the occasional tendency to be racist, sexist, or homophobic, noticeably more than the two other kinds of fanboys.)
The reason they love their OS remain a mystery, because most of these posts don't even bother justifying their assertions, so I don't really understand what their complaints about other operating systems are.
The only real benefit of running Windows in 2026 is software compatibility, so I'm forced to assume these people are ~70 years old, but I don't really know. They certainly rage and moan like dementia patients.
Why am I writing this post? It's because I'm really tired.
When I was in high school, I loved technology. I loved trying new operating systems. I loved hearing about new programming languages. I loved learning about different algorithms, different technologies, different sub-fields (such as cybersecurity).
Now I spend 8 hours a day frustrated and annoyed with technology at work. When I come home I'm too tired to program or tinker, so I go online and read about what other people are doing with tech. And you know what I see? A constant stream of hate and vitriol. I constantly get recommended YouTube channels like UFD Tech (and many, many others, not just singling out him) whose main messages are:
WINDOWS SUCKS! MACOS SUCKS! DESKTOP LINUX IS KIND OF BAD BUT YOU SHOULD USE IT ANYWAYS BECAUSE WE SAID SO! WEB TECH SUCKS! HARDWARE SUCKS! SOCIAL MEDIA SUCKS! AI SUCKS! MICRO-SERVICES SUCK! CLOUD SUCKS! ANYTHING WRITTEN AFTER THE YEAR 2000 SUCKS! EVERYONE IS STEALING YOUR DATA! EVERY COMPANY IS TRYING TO SCAM YOU! DON'T EVER TRY ANYTHING NEW, YOU WILL JUST GET MOCKED! (UNLESS THAT THING IS INSTALLING LINUX IN SOME QUIRKY WAY!)
And the only constant theme, the one comment which perfectly embodies this feeling of dejected nihilism, ever-present, on every single video, every comment section, on every website, is:
"Oh, you use ${SOME_OS}? Wow you're a fucking idiot. You should be using ${ANOTHER_OS}."
Being a fanboy does not make you cool. Being afraid of using different technology than you're used to does not make you smart. Berating someone else for how they accomplished something doesn't make you enlightened. Not understanding that other people have different needs and preferences doesn't mean your way is the best.
In fact, I'd assert that OS fanboys hate computers. They almost never actually do anything with computers, they just want to belittle others and complain. They are scared of new technology and eschew anything not inside their little fiefdoms.
... And, yeah, the Internet does suck and companies are all out to get you. But isn't that even more of a reason to be nicer to your fellow common man? Why do techies hate themselves so much?
Are things really that bad?
