I totally agree that the problem is lack of mechanical sympathy.
A big problem is simply that software development is too hyped, and there is too much money in the industry, so there are too many unexperienced developers bringing bad software. Also, projects are too ambitious, leading to compartmentalization of implementation, leading to slow and unreliable code. The problem often starts already with the things that people want to build.
And my guess is that the use of Java and other object languages is highly correlated with these developments.
The problem is that mechanical sympathy seems to be a lost art, and it is going to be slow as molasses regardless of the language being used.
What to expect when Electron is the new darling for writing desktop applications?