Also, for people who hate memory safety issues, does it really matter which language? Rust is a solution with momentum. For the people motivated by that concern, fighting over language choice is a distraction.
But as bawolff said, the main issue is moving towards safer tech. If Ada had good enough momentum, we'd be discussing Ada in the kernel instead. C++ has been rejected from Linux, leaving Rust as the only kernel-capable language with enough momentum, so Rust it is.
That has nothing to do with memory safety though let alone Rust specifically. What we need is a smarter way to manage authentication (non-persistent session cookies and usage a password manager to handle the log in is a step in the right direction).
To some degree, it doesn't matter how Rust acquired the energy; if you want to hop the gap, gotta hitch a ride on the highest energy wave.