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Object-oriented programming (OOP, also object-obsessed programming, objectfuscated programming or artificial inelegance) is a [programming paradigm](paradigm.md) that tries to model reality as a collection of abstract objects that communicate with each other and obey some specific rules. While the idea itself isn't bad and can be useful in certain cases, **OOP has become extremely overused, extremely badly implemented and downright forced in programming languages** which apply this [abstraction](abstraction.md) to every single program and concept, creating [anti-patterns](anti_pattern.md), unnecessary issues and of course [bloat](bloat.md) We therefore see OOP as a **[cancer](cancer.md) of software development**. OOP is basically a fashion wave that scarred programming for decades. Many others oppose it, e.g. [Bitreich](bitreich.md) voice criticism in their manifesto, saying we rather need a *subject oriented programming*; the idea of OOP being real bad is leaking even into the mainstream so it's becoming less and less controversial to shit on it.
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Object-oriented programming (OOP, also object-obsessed programming, objectfuscated programming or artificial inelegance) is a [programming paradigm](paradigm.md) that tries to model reality as a collection of abstract objects that communicate with each other and obey some specific rules. While the idea itself isn't bad and can be useful in certain cases and while pure OOP in very old languages like [Smalltalk](smalltalk.md) may have even been quite elegant, by later adoption by [capitalist businesses](capitalist_software.md) the concept has been extremely twisted and degenerated to unbelievable levels -- **OOP has become extremely overused, extremely badly implemented and downright forced in programming languages** that nowadays try to apply this [abstraction](abstraction.md) to every single program and concept, creating [anti-patterns](anti_pattern.md), unnecessary issues and of course greatly significant amounts of [bloat](bloat.md). [We](lrs.md) therefore see the OOP of today as a **[cancer](cancer.md) of programming**. OOP was basically a software development fashion wave that scarred the industry for decades, it has poisoned minds of several generations. Nowadays despite OOP still keeping many fans the critical stance towards it isn't even controversial anymore, many others have voiced the criticism over and over, usually the most competent programmers like [Richard Stallman](rms.md) and [Linux Torvalds](torvalds.md) and groups like [suckless](suckless.md) and [bitreich](bitreich.md). Ugly examples of OOP gone bad include [Java](java.md) and [C++](cpp.md) (which at least doesn't force it). Other languages such as [Python](python.md) and [Javascript](javascript.md) include OOP but have lightened it up a bit and at least allow you to avoid using it. You should probably learn OOP but only to see why it's bad (and to actually understand 99% of code written nowadays).
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**A [real life](irl.md) analogy** to give a bit of high level overview: the original [Smalltalk](smalltalk.md) style OOP was kind of like when society invented [democracy](democracy.md) -- a simple idea which everyone understands (we are 10 cavemen, let's just vote on stuff mkay?) that's many times useful and works well, e.g. on a scale of a village or a small city. Then cities grew bigger (just as software did), into states and empires and the idea kept getting more and more complicated -- people just wanted to keep the democracy, apply it to everything and scale it indefinitely, but for that they had to add more complexity, they implemented representatives, parliaments, senates, presidents, vicepresidents, ministers, judges, more and more bureaucracy, hybrid ideas (free market, controlled economy, ...), corruption and inefficiencies crept in, the system degenerated into what we have today -- a hugely expensive paperworking machine that's exploited and hacked, with laws so complicated no one really understands them, with [magic](magic.md), randomness and unpredictability, producing just waste and bullshit, crumbling under own weight. This is also the way OOP went -- they started inventing static classes, multiple inheritances, interfaces, design patterns, hybrid paradigms and so on until we ended up with ugly abominations on which today's technology stands. Now a few things have to be noted. Firstly these abominations are a disaster, they came from our mistake of taking the original simple idea (simple small scale voting democracy) and saying "let's make this the only thing in the world and let's scale it a million times!" Such idea is stupid from the start and there is no doubt about that. However another evil is that people are taught to do everything this way -- today's programmers will use the mainstream OOP everywhere, even in simple programs, they don't even think about if they should, they are simply taught "always use this". This is like in real life wanting to govern a family by having elections each year to vote for the head of the family, then having members of family vote for other members of the family to be their representatives that will talk for them (the same kind of craziness as wanting to strictly respect encapsulation even in trivial programs), then if someone wants to buy anything he has to ask for a budget several months in advance and have others vote on it while an elected anti corruption committee is watching etcetc. This kind of insanity is what's normal in software nowadays. Now the only sane discussion can be had only about the usefulness and scope of the original, simple idea (simple voting in small groups, simple pure OOP) and here we say that it may be good, but only applied to just some specific situations, i.e. we say simple OOP is good for some problems but not all, just like voting is a good solution to some problems (e.g. a group of friends deciding where to go party), but not all (e.g. passengers in a car voting on which way to steer and which pedals to press).
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