Could partially be the TIMTOWTDI thing. People mixing:
$foo->{bar};
$$foo{bar};
And quoting or not the key, etc. Slices and individual elements, etc. Probably looks like line noise to outsiders when you have a long one using parens to grab a specific array element, combined with $$ and so forth.
Plus many years of Bash script intended one-liners to replace or augment awk/sed leading a lot of Perl Golfers to a sublanguage that makes APL look far saner in comparison. That the code golf then shows up in "production scripts" and libraries (if for no other reason than muscle memory) builds a fortress wall to readability by outsiders.
$foo->{bar};
$$foo{bar};
And quoting or not the key, etc. Slices and individual elements, etc. Probably looks like line noise to outsiders when you have a long one using parens to grab a specific array element, combined with $$ and so forth.