I completely agree. The fact that there are so many abstractions that compile/transpile into javascript is also a big red flag. What other languages do you see that in? And then of course there is the horrible standard library, where the most obvious functions don't exist and require a package and maintainer.
I find it extremely telling that both of the issues you linked are now included in the core language library, and what happened with left-pad will never happen again after amends were made by npm to make sure that it indeed never does.
If you want to critize JavaScript you can do better with something more substantial. If anything, the speed at which problems you linked get remedied is a plus for the language. Even more so if you take into account the extremely unique position JavaScript is in where you can simply never change an API after it goes public.
> The fact that there are so many abstractions that compile/transpile into javascript is also a big red flag
What did you expect? JavaScript is the only language browsers natively understand. If you want to write code in your favorite programming language you will have to transpile/compile it to JS.
No, it really isn't... it's for code that absolutely must perform well, without the need for browser plugin/extension installation. Gaming logic, transcoding streams, etc.
If you want to critize JavaScript you can do better with something more substantial. If anything, the speed at which problems you linked get remedied is a plus for the language. Even more so if you take into account the extremely unique position JavaScript is in where you can simply never change an API after it goes public.
> The fact that there are so many abstractions that compile/transpile into javascript is also a big red flag
What did you expect? JavaScript is the only language browsers natively understand. If you want to write code in your favorite programming language you will have to transpile/compile it to JS.