Well, for instance, there's this meme that GNOME only removes stuff, and people complaining that "GNOME developers don't let you do anything". To me, my knee-jerk response to that is always: this is Linux! Use something else if you want more customisability, because you can!
There is the notion of "opiniated software" which I am a fan of. Seems to that I probably would be quite happy with GNOME if I would be a Linux user.
More to the point though, doesn't a complain such as you stated imply that the complaining party is aware of high configuratibility as an expected standard?
I've never met a Linux user who failed to appreciate that.