Yeah, fuck being able to understand what someone hands you to make sure it was done correctly. It's also pretty lame to be able to modify their work so you don't have to wait 24 hours on them to implement a small change. because they live half way around the world.
You should listen to him, because he apparently knows every "real programmer" in the world and speaks for them. There's nothing like being forced into using Windows or having a random whitespace kick your ass for an hour.
Java is a steaming pile of crap. Anyone in this day and age that recommends Java for web development should immediately be shot.
2004 called and wants it's MySQL / PostgreSQL argument back.
LOL @ python, C#, and PHP just generating HTML. Please never join another thread talking about programming, because you clearly have no clue what you're talking about. I can use Bash, Perl, TCL, or C to generate HTML, but that doesn't mean that's all they do. Even in a web app setting the language used does a hell of a lot more than just generate html.
Sorry, but you're 100% wrong. The best distro a newbie could possible use would be something like Slackware or Gentoo. Source distributions will force them to actually learn how to use Linux instead of holding their hands and give them a false sense of accomplishment.