I don't think it's obviously more counterintuitive than the strict XHTML insistence on exact explicit hierarchy. Like, when you start a new paragraph it doesn'

I don't think it's obviously more counterintuitive than the strict XHTML insistence on exact explicit hierarchy. Like, when you start a new paragraph it doesn't become a new "subparagraph", it just ends the current one and starts a new one. I really don't think it's hard. I do think omitting needless stuff creates more compact documents with less redundant boilerplate that distracts the eyes.