Matt Godbolt sold me on Rust by showing me C++

What if we have a C that removes the quirks without adding too much brain drain?

So no implicit type conversions, safer strings, etc.

I'm inferring that you think Rust adds too much brain drain? If so, what?

The borrow checker rejects loads of sound programs - just read https://rust-unofficial.github.io/too-many-lists/

Aliasing rules can also be problematic in some circumstances (but also beneficial for compiler optimisations).

And the orphan rule is also quite restrictive for adapting imported types, if you're coming from an interpreted language.

https://loglog.games/blog/leaving-rust-gamedev/ sums up the main issues nicely tbh.