If this is something you're interested in doing, enough to take the time to learn the ropes.. then don't let anyone discourage you.
It will take time, and effort, but if you read the latest undeadly article.. Henning Brauer only had a basic understanding of the C language when he first started using OpenBSD, but he has gone on to make very large and influential changes to the networking stack and PF.
There are a lot of people who prefer using high level languages for occasion programming tasks, but there is a lot to be said about learning how to use system-level languages and getting a better grasp on how things work, like memory allocations, pointer management.
I find obscuring those details to be a negative influence on programmers, languages like VB tend to shield even basic concepts about computers away from their users, adding a layer of eye candy and misdirection.
Indeed it is a matter of personal taste, perhaps you shouldn't limit your "pallet", but I would wager a person using C alone would be better off than someone who used an interpreted language.
http://undeadly.org/cgi?action=artic...20101115091138