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:

The language sucks. It is not OO as not everything is an object. int type and Integer object. Shit.

Interface methods must be public. Shit.

Exception handling is a joke. catch can only handle a single exception type.

Empty interfaces uses as annotations.

The JVM is always shit.

It is slow and a resource hog. Every fucking object as a sync monitor. All of them.

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.

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.

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

If you want to learn a true OO, garbage collected, cross platform language/framework stick with .Net.