Of course it's not a good thing... If you want to hack on your system only to find out that it's all been prepackaged and filled with bells and whistles that can't be removed, there ain't much hacking you can do!
Sometimes, one wants to hack on other than the system.
I'm not sure who you're addressing, because I never argued against that...
in my original comment: "[some people] rather something that "just works""