Cottagecore Programmers

Original Article ↗ Hacker News Discussion ↗

Alienation from Screen-Based Tech Work

  • Many describe sitting at a computer all day as draining, abstract, and disconnected from tangible outcomes.
  • Work often feels Sisyphean: tickets, JIRA, Agile, broken builds, changing requirements, and tech churn (“new frameworks” treadmill).
  • Bureaucracy, metrics, PR nitpicks, and shareholder value-focus erode autonomy and pride; some feel like “factories to build factories” rather than creators.
  • Remote work intensifies the question: “What do I actually do all day?”—especially when explaining it to children.

Appeal of Farming / Homesteading / Manual Work

  • Strong attraction to concrete, local, physical results: “I grew food,” “I built a wall/deck/table,” “I fixed the pig’s water system.”
  • Manual tasks provide clear feedback loops, visible progress, and a sense of competence and resourcefulness many fear they lack if software demand collapses.
  • Some see homesteading as complementary: a grounding counterweight to abstract, high-paid desk work, not a full replacement.

Reality Check: Farming Is Hard, Risky, and Often Miserable

  • Multiple posters with farm backgrounds emphasize: full-time farming is physically punishing, economically precarious, and knowledge‑intensive.
  • Romantic “cottagecore” imagery ignores hailstorms wiping out crops, livestock deaths, constant chores in any weather, debt for machinery, and poor margins.
  • Distinction is drawn between:
    • subsistence / commercial farming (high stress, low autonomy), and
    • hobby farms / “larping” enabled by tech money (pleasant but incomparable).
  • Advice: try a week or two on a real farm, or start with a small garden or a few chickens before making life changes.

Alternative Responses to Alienation

  • Many prefer non-farm outlets: hiking, skiing, bouldering, city farms, woodworking, wildlife photography, car mechanics, volunteering.
  • Some advocate “craft programming” in small, value-aligned companies instead of giant corporations.
  • Homesteading and tech can mix (e.g., microcontrollers/IoT for farm tasks).

Meaning, Capitalism, and Moral Questions

  • Debate over whether most tech work is socially positive, neutral, or actively harmful (ads, extractive platforms, “weaponized capitalism”).
  • Others defend clear benefits: communication, knowledge access, hardware advances.
  • Thread circles around work as identity: desire to contribute and build community vs. rejecting the idea that a person’s worth equals their economic output.