[luuio]

Everything you said is true. C++ gives you everything you need to be safe. But that's not the point. Rust makes it HARD (or very hard) to do things that are unsafe.

It's not what C++ can or cannot do, it's not what Rust can or cannot do. It's what the Rust language and compiler opinionatedly encourage you to do and not to do. This is what's lacking in C++.

[blub]

I think many people - me included - are complaining that it makes things hard period. Not in the sense of “rocket science” as this argument is sometimes smugly dismissed, but in the sense of extra friction which slows things down and decreases the pleasure of coding.