I can't emphasize how much I disagree with you. You can do an incredible amount with Javascript with very few symbols to learn up front. If your goal is to get people interested in programming, there is nothing more discouraging than having to trudge through learning the intricacies of a relatively "safe" language with rigid types, inheritance models, and dozens of enigmatic exceptions.

Notice that I'm not saying these things are bad, but they are certainly more than a beginner needs to learn basic syntax and become familiar with control flow.