Thanks @Dan_Abrams - Facebooked… …and is definitely on-topic IMHO.
The old saying of play the ball not the man, and the concept of a battle of ideas not people, would seem to suggest it okay to attack JS but not the person using JS.
The problem is that people are so attached to the languages they use and their communities that it becomes part of their self identify and their group identity. This results in an attack on JS feeling like an attack to the recipient.
At times this may be not understood by the person doing the attack. For many, the thinking is more in terms of the right tool for the job. It may seem overly sensitive to take it to heart.
Somewhere in there is a middle ground involving good humour and respect. We should be able to joke about the stupid things in JS - it’s nice and reinforcing for us! JS folks who don’t make the move will undoubtably joke about Elm when they understand it better, around the reasons they didn’t make the move.
Am I saying ‘Just lighten up, people’? A bit more than that. Do it with empathy.
Standing up in a crowd of JS folks you’d have to be quite skilled or clever to get the balance right since they are unlikely to have much knowledge of Elm. And keep in mind that people read public forums like this in the process of deciding to engage, so they will see what we are like as a group. Any heavy handed language control would also be a negative. Better to have an invitational approach with a factual and light-hearted attitude to the differences. The product is good enough to sell itself once people have a play.