I think people get unhappy that their favorite language doesn’t have real GC and it becomes an extension of their language advocacy. Python didn’t have GC for a long time.
Not everyone wants GC either, so the mix of feelings must have been complex.
I didn't much follow these kind of holy wars, but I've seen people leave Java partly to get away from GC, same as people in the Objective C community being pretty happy to get ARC instead of heavier GC systems.
