Programming language geek

Yesterday I had dinner with a good friend who is a Googler. At a certain point in our conversation, we started talking about the rise of functional programming languages. My friend, who is a c++ fanatic, at one point in the conversation said "(function programming languages) are great for playing with, but only programming language geeks think they're worthwhile". I've spent my entire life fending off reductionist labels.. even techie, despite my entire career as a silicon valley engineer. However, I couldn't fight the label. Every nerve in my body wanted to explain why he was wrong and why functional programming was the solution to incomprehensible state and the cure to never having to deal with another legacy codebase. In the end though, I think my friend is right. I am a programming language junky. I don't know if functional programming can really prevent careless code. But if it worn't for the people who gave a shit about code and the menial features of languages, I can't imagine that any large scale codebase could actually function. I'm not sure there would be a google for my friend who wrote me off as a "programming language geek" to work at.