So, I don't use either of these things, but still tend to read the arguments between people who do, and that isn't what it feels like to me (as again, someone who doesn't use either of these things).

Specifically, it feels like you are missing that the people who argue against k8s are saying that it is extremely difficult to configure, and so instead of this clean "some people don't understand that it is nice to have a system that just works", it feels like the argument is actually about a tradeoff between what you think is easier to put together: a single system with a million options that seem to all need to be configured or it doesn't work or a handful of systems that are each easy to understand in separate, but where you will need to do all the glue manually.