Is it Man or Woman important for successful marriage? Your comment sounds similar to this :) I do not hate either. ORM or not, developers dealing with db data needs to understand how it works. If they do not, they may still come up with working application but when performance issues come up, they become deer in headlights.The same argument applies to ORM or any other technology. Long time Hibernate user here.For me, Martin Fowler's article hits the nail.