Because spending years setting up a system using nothing but open source from the start, you'd still not approach what windows can do out the box with far less effort.

This is a flawed argument, the opposite of:

Because spending years stripping(*) a system from adware and bloat, you'd still not approach how slim Linux can be out of the box with far less effort.

Just pick a target, then use whichever tool gets you closer to it... and I think you know it, no need for a rant.

(* there are actual tools to strip and reset the tracking and ads in Windows... obviously for people who accepted to get early updates, install the "Preview" versions, and haven't read that it means they're now betatesters with telemetry enabled 🙄)

PS: settling on a "single GUI", is kind of ironic given the multiple GUI versions of the control panel in modern Windows.