I've come to view applications which rely on JavaScript to be fundamentally broken, no matter how small the functionality it implements. I don't even have to give specific examples, with developer tools open it's rare not to see red as you traverse the "modern" web, and even when it isn't I can break the world by disabling JavaScript, I don't even need an extension to do it. The same doesn't apply to HTML, or even CSS.
The number of people who disable Javascript is probably less than people who refuse to or can't upgrade from really old browsers, where all the current HTML and CSS is going to break.
I don't get the HN hysteria over Javascript. You have a powerful host (I won't even call it a client, because it can and should be so much more). It would be crazy not to use it. Sure, it can be abused or programmed poorly, code should be tested. But in my wide-ranging use of the Web which involves a ton of Javascript, that has rarely been a problem.
I don't think people generally (not even on hn) has anything against powerful capable tools developed in js. What people do tend to hate though is using js to do something that could have easily been done without it.
