Get out.

A thought: Alan Turing died when he was 41. Anything Turing would have invented between 41 and his natural death are things lost to society because of the persecution of homosexuals. What an incredible cost.

Seriously. This is merely a precursor to what you'll experience in coming months if you stick around. Their policy against outside development is a symptom of diseased thinking, and if you have diseased thought dictating policy, things never work out for the better.

Your current employer should be considered an enemy to your well-being and you need to find new employment post-haste.

A nice quote from the last chapter:

Programming as a profession is only moderately interesting. It can be a good job, but if you want to make about the same money and be happier you could actually just go run a fast food joint. You are much better off using code as your secret weapon in another profession.

Well said, Zed. Very well said indeed.

Easy rule-of-thumb: if you think somebody is stupid, ask "Help me to understand"

I've found that once you understand, very, very rarely do you think they are stupid any more.

I couldn't agree with you more.

On a personal note, I must admit that the level of arrogance seen in IT is sometimes quite overwhelming. Just because someone can use a computer does not automatically make them smart; other people have other skills, amazing! ;)