[alsiola]

A concrete example then. Commonly want to prevent form submission default behaviour.

Vanilla

  <script>
    const form = document.getElementById("form");
    form.addEventListener("submit", event => event.preventDefault())
  </script>
  <form id="form">...</form>

React

  <form onSubmit={event => event.preventDefault()}>...</form>

Vue

  <form @submit.prevent="onSubmit">...</form>

React's API has guided the developer to learn about events. If they move outside the React ecosystem they have transferable knowledge. As someone unfamiliar with React, but used to the DOM you're surely comfortable here. Yes, the syntax isn't identical to how you might use this in vanilla JS, but it's clearly the same concept. It's just been made a little nicer to use - the sugar.

Vue's API has reinvented the wheel. There's one place this syntax is useful and one place alone - Vue itself. It hasn't used my existing knowledge, or pushed me to become more familiar with the platform upon which I'm building. That's not sugar, that's a new language.

I've probably got the vanilla example wrong - when you don't do it frequently it's not the most ergonomic thing in the world. React takes that API, doesn't deviate far from it, and makes it easier to use. Sugar.

[tobr]

Fun example! Strange conclusion. React actually uses a synthetic event system that is subtly different from the native one in all kinds of little ways. In reading the docs it’s hard to even get an overview of what’s different. Bubbling is a bit different, onChange works like the input event for some reason, various props and methods have been added. This is not the case for Vue! It just uses standard events.

The .prevent modifier in Vue is completely optional, you can call .preventDefault() yourself. Note that React also uses a kind of modifier but only for capturing events (onClickCapture etc). It does not have any way that I know to add a passive event, for some reason.

Vue is the one that actually offers syntax sugar, and does so much more consistently, with the semantics identical to the browser. React changes the semantics for unclear, historical reasons, and then adds half-baked syntax sugar on top.

[alsiola]

I'm not claiming React is perfect by any means, and like any popular relatively longstanding project is is bound by sometimes unwise historical decision. It just seems to be currently in vogue to take a pop at it. If you want to extol the virtues of Vue/Svelte/whatever then great, but React is still IMO a great option and deserves some defense.