Why Elvis Should Not Visit Java

The Elvis operator (null-safe member selection) works well in languages like Kotlin because their type systems distinguish nullable from non-nullable types, forcing developers to handle nullability explicitly. In Java, which lacks this distinction, adding Elvis would make it trivially easy to propagate null references without understanding why values are missing—making the wrong choice the easy one. The real problem with null isn't NPEs but the conflation of many different 'missing value' semantics into one concept. Rather than adding Elvis, Java developers should eliminate null from APIs or use Optional thoughtfully.