Who actually holds this belief, that garbage collection is a requirement for reliable software? Most people don't work with such software but surely everyone who even thinks about programming is aware that it exists. I mean, you don't have to dive deep into computing to know that cars are full of computers and software these days.
Keep reading HN. You'll see articles and comments that state (or imply) that normal humans can't handle memory management, and therefore GC is the way to avoid bugs and memory leaks.
Sorry, I can't give you references off the top of my head, but I've seen that stated, here, in the last couple of months at least.
I get this feeling too, and I wonder if it is from a large vocal group of people who have never ever developed anything in C or C++, yet appear to know all about how "dangerous" it is and enjoy mocking the languages, whilst pointing to niche languages with much smaller development tool ecosystems and support libraries.
