I mean, I literally opened my post talking about how it's the structure of your system, as in the components you choose to make up your desktop. The kernel is u

I mean, I literally opened my post talking about how it's the structure of your system, as in the components you choose to make up your desktop. The kernel is ultimately irrelevant, that's the point, I'm not sure how you managed to miss that. Linux does not have a canonical userland beyond the GNU Coreutils*, no matter how much Redhat and its sycophants would like it to be the case. Windows does, however. When you're complaining about Linux, you're complaining about your specific choices in how you structured the system, usually boiling down to your choice of distribution (but not essentially.) You can certainly at any point pack up your bags and leave the dogshit behind, your pain is a self-inflicted gunshot wound. Such is not the case on Windows, where you are proffered absolutely no choice, because there is a canonical desktop experience. Nobody made you use Gnome or other such crap. But there are certainly plenty of people who will lie to you and try to get you to stay within Redhat's kingdom of sewage.