I've noticed a near 1:1 overlap of people who advocate against shadow development, and people experiencing status anxiety about the fact that AI has proven that they barely pass the bar.

Some arguments about shadow development and IT are valid, like security and who takes ownership after the original developers leave, but they don't really account for the reality that organizations expand constantly, business needs are perpetually exploding and most development shops are so mired in business requirements and bureaucracy that there's genuinely no value involved with interacting with them.

You do realize that you're making the exact same arguments as a dictator who just commandeered a tank, right?

> business needs are perpetually exploding

Ignorance is perpetually overthinking. If you want to be an engineer, you should quit your current role and reapply instead of ranting on here.