JavaScript isn't cancer

> JS actually has a fairly small amount of quirks compared to other dynamic languages.

...like Python or Lisp or Erlang or Objective-C or Lua?

Your argument on Ruby's quirks is also weak. Ruby's "semantic richness", like modules and classes, or blocks, procs, and lambdas, at least doesn't bite your ass on every step. It's not comparable to JavaScript's type system and asynchronity built into the language's environment, where you constantly need to watch out.

> What do you get? You get a TON of people working in it to extend it in various different ways. And they invent a TON of stuff!

...like left-pad or other similarly important modules. Most of this "ton of stuff" would be completely unnecessary if JavaScript had a standard library of any usefulness.

> Will JavaScript finally gain the status it deserves then?

It already has. JavaScript and its community worked very hard to earn how they're seen by the rest of the world.