Clearly I'm not a PL researcher. However, I have friends who are. They too have a tendency towards hyperbole about the importance of their field. You've just inverted the hyperbole: this field is such toxic fakery we're robbing taxpayers and ruining young minds!
At all the good universities, the computer science department is also part of the electrical engineering department. Thus you have valuable research going on which crosses between hardware, software, information theory, physics, etc.
The people running these departments know that along the way, a few somewhat promising computer scientists will get sucked into reading philosophy books as a hobby, and lose their way in the world. These people become PL researchers (in the sense you're using the phrase) . The school earmarks minimal funds and provides minimal infrastructure, like a USENET group or a mailing list for these types (no pun intended). They know by doing this they will successfully keep them from messing up useful research (best case) or living on the streets (worst case).
I don't disagree at all, but neither do I repent. I just think the world needs equal and opposite hyperbole.
But I also think it needs PL design - in the sense of Guy Steele, Paul Graham, Guido von Rossum, etc, etc, etc. And I do think the existence of "PL research" is a serious detriment to the organization and development of PL design. At the very least, they should be parallel subfields.
At all the good universities, the computer science department is also part of the electrical engineering department. Thus you have valuable research going on which crosses between hardware, software, information theory, physics, etc.
The people running these departments know that along the way, a few somewhat promising computer scientists will get sucked into reading philosophy books as a hobby, and lose their way in the world. These people become PL researchers (in the sense you're using the phrase) . The school earmarks minimal funds and provides minimal infrastructure, like a USENET group or a mailing list for these types (no pun intended). They know by doing this they will successfully keep them from messing up useful research (best case) or living on the streets (worst case).