My own theory is that the repution points accrued by postings here are not so much a reflection of one's programming skill and/or knowledge in Perl (though this certainly counts for some cred), but are in larger part a reflection of one's ability to communicate effectively with other programmers, no matter whether asking questions or giving answers.

I hope its true for most of the friars (like me) and higher-ups that our "skills are still very much in development". Being a "true advocate and supporter" probably earns more points than being an antagonist, in general, but I could easily vote for someone who said something like "here's an idea, which is really useful because..., and I can make it really fast/intuitive/maintainable/robust in language X, but it really sucks if I try it this way in Perl..." -- provided that the necessary details are concisely given to make the point (ideally with a dispassionate tone).

If such a complaint is justified, everyone gains by seeing a limitation of the language clearly demonstrated (and word gets around to the creators about something that probably needs fixing) -- everyone wins; if the "antagonist" is just using the worst of various approaches, the replies that get the most points will be the ones that simply show better ways to do it in Perl, and everyone wins again.

Thanks for posting some very well-stated nodes.