The author presented their opinion as broadly stroked general advice and in that context it is poor. And, specifically regarding database/sql, creating a bunch of pointers to scan values into for every query you write is the definition of insanity in all but the most performance sensitive applications. We're talking microseconds (or even nanoseconds in some instances) on an operation typically measured in milliseconds.
You don’t need an ORM for that, though. I’ve used Scany in the past, and it was great. Raw, parameterized SQL that is easy to reason about and easy to scan into your structs:
These things exist on a spectrum of features but they are all mapping tables to objects at the end of the day at the bare minimum. Pedantry around what technically should count as an ORM is not super productive. The fact is that defining a schema in one place and getting a whole slew of features out of that automatically is multiplicative to productivity.
This is the sweet spot in my opinion. I haven't been in the .NET world for a few years but there's a very similar library called Dapper. Best "ORM" I ever used.
