I have a foot in both camps, having started my commercial flying career in a Shed, with no automatics at all, and finished on the Airbus FBW family, with the BAe146 and Boeing 737 on the way. So just by way of balance, that magenta guy strikes me as one who doesn't really trust 'new fangled' automatics. You simply cannot fly some of the things we fly today without automatics and the Nav systems we have now, so we need to know how to use them quickly and correctly. There are very good reasons for having the destination runway in the FMC of an Airbus FBW and it is a doddle to change it over.
There used to be three crew on the flight deck - two pilots and one engineer. Now there are only two, so more has to be monitored by fewer pairs of eyes and there are only two people to :
fly
navigate
trouble shoot
read checklists.
listen to ATC clearances
check correct selections being made by PF
fuel check
fuel transfer
engine check
prevent engine exceedances
ditto flap and gear speeds,
Cabin calls
Airframe de- or anti-ice.
Perform emergency drills and checklists.
T/O and landing performance
Fuelling
System 'admin' e.g. pressurisation and air-conditioning
Automatics help greatly with this increased workload.
Not all automatics are very well integrated and some have to be watched carefully, - hence no auto-thrust without auto-pilot on some, but Airbus FBW automatics and auto-thrust are excellent. This of course, while helping enormously with the workload, can bring problems of rusting hand flying skills: When tired or not wanting to screw up and cause a go-around after a long transatlantic crossing or whatever, it is very easy to rely on some or all of the automatics.
Chief pilots need to implement systems where hand flying is very strongly encouraged - preferred even - under certain conditions, so as to keep their pilot's skills sharp and flying ability up to speed, without jeopardising the commercial program.