That kind of turns the question into a chicken-and-egg problem, doesn't it?

I think it's a chicken and egg problem to begin with...

And I'm not sure how a beginner would get around that. I certainly didn't...

Maybe it's necessary to spend some time with "the wrong language" in order to learn why it's not the one for you. In my case, it didn't take much Pascal for me to realize I didn't want to continue with it. It was too formal for my tastes. I like Perl's informality.

To learn "pure" programming, Perl itself may not be the best choice...

I think you're right. If you want to learn "pure" programming, Perl does way too much for you, behind the scenes. For that sort of thing, maybe the Assember to C to C++ path makes more sense. But I'm getting over my head, here - I don't have deep experience with any of those three, so I could be off base...

As usual, the answer to this question depends on the answer to the question, "What's your goal?" There are any number of paths, but they don't all lead to the same place.
That's is a good thing.