He could split the text into two span-tags on the server and deliver them. Activated JS could than hide the second portion. This would limit the necessary JS logic to a minimum.

I'm not sure anymore if there is a possibility for server side detection of JS in the HTTP headers, worst case would be a JS-triggered redirect to another path.

> I for one have a general policy of simply leaving sites that do not render with JavaScript disabled.

I have a contrary view, JS is disabled by default in my browsers and I tend to ignore blank sites. That's why I prefer minimal "static" functionality with optional JS add-ons. YMMV.

But yeah, how to handle (no) JS was not part of the MVC concepts, and still causing the biggest headache.