Declarative macros are very like regex's: both in that at first they seem incredibly dense and arcane but once you work out how to read them they're actually very simple, and in that the syntax is literally similar in that it's a list of tokens that must match sequentially.
So if we're saying this means regex isn't simple then - having observed that my University's Math course has two semester long Number Theory courses we must conclude that the integers aren't simple either, right ?
And yet, the integers are simple enough that's where we start five year olds, by counting things.
Simple and Shallow are not the same thing.
Recent article this week in German press, as per IQB-Bildungstrend 2024 results, one third of students fail in math exams.
Which reinforces the common culture that math is hard, and it is to be expected not to have great grades at it.