Well, I must still be misunderstanding you because I spent 30 minutes writing a whole comment explaining why Math is important then got to the bottom of your co

Well, I must still be misunderstanding you because I spent 30 minutes writing a whole comment explaining why Math is important then got to the bottom of your comment and realized we both believe the same thing (that these subjects are important). What I will contend is that pity parties about scary topics are unhelpful and rigor is important - more so for self-taught people. Like you, I advocate humane teaching. Humane teaching, to me however, is more about adapting to learning styles while maintaining the rigor and difficulty of the material (without watering it down) - this article watered it down. Clear and humane explanations are out there; this article was not one of them. The intention was noble and I respect them for that but I agree with the top commenter in that the pity party needs to end and more self-educated individuals need to be role models for those that do find it scary so that we can all (as in self-educated people) strive to understand difficult concepts instead of "being okay" with not fully understanding it or the language it was meant to be understood in. Much as autodidactic scholars hold themselves up to very high standards when reading about an author, they read the author's works in the original language they were written in - not in its translations (this is slight speculation because I don't know any autodidactic scholars personally, but I have read some of their articles).