Comment by Arainach
I'm curious about your objection to the proposal. Sure, generics mean that libraries need a bit more syntax - that's true in all languages - but the actual consumption of the AssociationList type here is clean and readable.
Most types don't need to be generics. Containers do, and I prefer a bit of generics syntax to copy/pasting the container ten times for ten types.
You spend more time reading code that writing it. Optimising for the later is a mistake. I guess the noticeable pushback against including generics was not unwarranted, people are just now starting to see the ripple effects we were warned about.