Basically, anything that isn’t packaged as a flatpak needs to be installed from the CLI using distrobox containers, which will go over the heads of the majority of new users.

Just like your “opponents” are over-generalising, you’re deliberately picking the most extreme examples to make your argument. (Batocera as a daily driver - you know that’s what Hanna Montana Linux is for!)

My Linux axioms are: for most new users…

1. choice of DE is most noticeable and decides whether they like their initial experience.
2. choice of base distro family does matter a lot in the long run (Debian-based vs. Arch-based vs. Redhat-based); if you stay inside the same family (e.g. Pop!OS vs. Ubuntu vs. Zorin vs. Mint), choice matters a lot less (and DE is most impactful, c.f. point one).
3. choosing a distro with specialised security hardening (immutable systems, Nix, Qubes, Bazzite) does matter; most of these will make new users unhappy or even question their sanity.

Where you are right: yes, the choices embedded within these three axioms do matter a lot and are noticeable, so it is helpful to have an experienced user recommend a distro to you when starting out.

Where the “distro don’t matter” people are right: there are a lot less choices to be made than meets the eye. Effectively, it can be boiled down to three.

But Facebook/“Meta” would never lie.

Oopsie! Hang on, they even lie to lawmakers in case buying them off fails? Bummer!

Seriously: this company needs to be scoured from the face of the earth.

When connected devices visited the selected domains, their connections were proxied through malicious servers before reaching their intended destination.
These adversary-in-the-middle servers used self-signed certificates. When the end user clicked through browser warnings, the servers captured all traffic passing through them.

🙈🙈🙈

We really, really, really need to teach people to read error messages, particularly certificate warnings, and not click “accept” at the drop of a hat.