>None of this means Rust is "bad" or that C is "better". It means they optimise for different values. Rust optimises for correctness and maintainability under heavy abstraction. C optimises for transparency and minimalism under extreme constraints.

>Sometimes you don't want a language that keeps you safe. Sometimes you want one that simply gets out of your way.

D lang is a wonderful Goldilocks in this regard between C and Rust. It has D-as-better-C [1]. There's no head scratching macro, excellent meta programming, bare metal programming and fast compile time and run time [2]. The programming syntax is very intuitive with UFCS [3].

[1] Better C:

https://dlang.org/spec/betterc.html

[2] Ask HN: Why do you use Rust, when D is available? (255 comments):

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23494490

[3] Function:

https://dlang.org/spec/function.html