Testers don't break code

It was about 9 am when Carl, our lead developer introduced me to Jesse, a recent college grad and our newest developer. Carl introduced me as "one of the QA team", to which Jesse said "Oh, you're one of the guys who breaks my code." I smiled at him and replied "Actually, the code's already broken by the time I get it." He paused for a moment, then laughed.

This perception of testers has always bothered me. I don't break anyone's code - I try to think of scenarios that the developer may have missed and help him make a better product. If I wanted to be a malicious little gremlin that "broke" code, I'd go into the source files and remove all the semicolons, or replace every instance of the letter e with a q. *That* would be breaking the code.

Testers are there to help developers build a better product. I think the issue arises when people take the issues testers log as personal negative feedback. One of the ways I was able to alleviate that was to do some pairs testing with a developer. We sat down, walked through the AUT, and I talked him through my thought process as I tested. At first he just watched, then started asking to try things as we went along. In short order, he had found issues that I wouldn't have thought to check for. Once he saw that I wasn't being malicious, his whole attitude toward the test team changed.

Have you encountered the "Testers break code" mentality? How did you resolve it?