> your "platform" is also typically a framework, like QT or AppKit or whatever you end up using

That's not what I consider "low level programming". I don't use any of these.

Yes you can do try and do plain Javascript. Honestly Javascript is a much less pleasurable environment than a compiled statically typed procedural language. The main advantage of the browser is you get a viewport, you get font rendering etc. with almost no setup required at all.