I can't say I understand this attitude. It's analogous to cutting off your nose to spite your face. Both Python 2 and 3 are actively supported, and there's a clear migration path defined. The migration isn't complete yet, but it's progressing at a development friendly pace.
I say this as someone still on Python 2.6 due to environment restrictions.
Speaking personally, I sought to move away to a utf8-friendly language from php a few years back, and seriously considered Python back then. It came highly recommended on Stack Overflow.
Upon investigating the matter further, however, it became clear that the community suffered greatly from the divide introduced by Python 3. As if the core devs went in one direction while the community at large went in another.
It wasn't exactly a welcoming place for a newcomer. As if you needed to pick sides on day one. I ended up selecting another language and have never looked back.
If anything, I'm bemused that the debate still rages on years later. And I can readily picture seasoned Python users being put off by the same, and looking elsewhere for a saner ecosystem.
Case in point: As some have already hinted in the thread, the point is becoming moot nowadays, not so much because the community is slowly making the switch to Python 3, but because community members are moving en masse to Node, Go, Scala, Clojure, etc.
What language would you recommend, that would have a similar jump in syntax, and still give you more speed and resolve memory usage?
Go? Go is painfully statically typed (painful example: requiring you to cast an int to float32 to do a `>` or `<` operation) and feels a lot more like writing C than Python (not to mention its lack in the "batteries included" department).
Ruby? Same speed and memory "problems" as Python.
Perl? Faster, but its language design philosophy is diametrically opposed to that of Python.
Clojure/Haskel? Syntax and program structure are so radically different from Python there's no comparing them to Python3 when discussing differences from Python2.
I'm actually leaning towards Haskell and Clojure these days. They get me more of the simplicity that Python won me over with along with other benefits.
I gave Go a chance to supplant Python as my main language, and I thin it could do that. I had a few other problems with Go though which led to me looking at Haskell.
I'm giving Haskell a chance to supplant Python/Go as my "go to" language atm and it seems to be winning me over, but only time will tell.
I would actually pick Go. Yes, the strong static typing is a pain in the ass, but the rules are simple and regular. It's easy to understand and implement.
The same cannot be said for the multitude of changes to Python.
I use/used Go for a while, but early on I thought the type system was stronger than it was. I was disappointed in a later project, and started looking at languages with stronger type systems.
I came across Haskell and Hindley Milner ;)
I believe Haskell replaces Go for me and with some experience (when I can picture types in my head better) it will replace python as my go to dynamic language.
Go would be my first recommendation. The strictly enforced coding habits, lack of generics, the packaging system without dependency versioning and quirks like typed nil are a small price to pay for the sane syntax, impressive performance and a very easy to use CSP implementation.
P.S.: I don't know what you mean by that example. You don't need to cast an int to anything in order to use comparison operators.
I say this as someone still on Python 2.6 due to environment restrictions.