If a language clearly states in the FM that something "criminal", in the words of your parent comment, is known to be criminal but they leave it as it is without any clear reason behind it (even recognizing it as a past error they have to carry for backward compatibility), the junior has all the right to think the language is criminal and is against them.

In the extreme case, take something like brainfuck. Everything is in the RTFM, but that doesn't make the language less criminal.

I like to remember that we are not here to program for the sake of programming. We are mainly solving problems. I have a problem that I know I need to solve with "a gun", and maybe I'm a novice to gun usage. After having a look at some guns, I choose the one who seems to be less dangerous and have a friendlier and more intuitive usage. When your very powerful but a deathtrap with 1000 page manual of a gun is used by no one, don't complain with "why you don't use my powerful and clearly better gun!?".

Because the key here is that this is not the 1970's anymore, when all guns were complicated. Learning by doing is the best way to learn, way better than learning by reading (https://thepeakperformancecenter.com/educational-learning/le...). If a language requires me to RTFM is at a big disadvantage with any other language that allows me to easily learn by doing.