Why is Java so popular

The introductory programming course at uni teaches Java, but you don't have to take it if you know a programming language. Should I teach myself python over the summer (I already know the basics) and avoid having to learn Java? Or are the haters just people who are scared of object orientation.

>Why people hate Java:
Oh boy this should be fun

>The language sucks. It is not OO as not everything is an >object. int type and Integer object. Shit.
One quirk of the language, all languages have quirks, doesn't affect anything other than making it a little harder to learn, and its already one of the easiest languages to pick up.

>Interface methods must be public. Shit.
No need for private interface methods, perhaps you should learn what polymorphism is and when you should use it.

>Exception handling is a joke. catch can only handle a single >exception type.
Another non-issue from a Microsoft fanboi.

>Empty interfaces uses as annotations.
This isn't a sentence, you fail.

>The JVM is always shit.
Blatantly false.

>It is slow and a resource hog.
False

>Every fucking object as a sync monitor. All of them.
No performance hit for multi-threaded issues unless you specifically request locking/synchronization features.

>Generics are a performance nightmare. The JVM stores all >generic instances as object and boxes/unboxed them when used >instead of just storing them as their type.
Definitely not a nightmare, all handled automatically, the way C# does it causes just as many issues as type-erasure does.

>The JVM and Java language make performance sacrifices to be >forward and backwards compatible. However, most code is >specific to a JVM version anyways because this is done so >poorly.
False, the core syntax of the language has hardly changed at all aside from generics.

>Other JVM languages are a joke, they are only wrappers for >Java and not first class.
Ummm, ok.

>If you want to learn a true OO, garbage collected, cross >platform language/framework stick with .Net.
C# is a java clone that happens to have met with some success because it has Microsoft behind it pushing it.  C# is nearly identical to java with the addition of some ugly language hacks.