CSS is very extremely well-specified in how it draws stuff, and if you use it within its bounds, it's very good at doing what it set out to accomplish. That is,

CSS is very extremely well-specified in how it draws stuff, and if you use it within its bounds, it's very good at doing what it set out to accomplish. That is, as a way to style content. It was not designed as a "draw a triangle" language, and I'm sure the original people behind the CSS standard would never have thought of exploiting the bevel effect to draw a triangle. I don't understand the attitude of "well, you're using CSS outside the bounds of what it was designed for, that means that CSS is ad-hoc garbage", nor the attitude of "well, you're exploiting CSS in a clever way, that means you're a terrible engineer". It's a clever hack in the truest sense of the word, and that makes me proud.