Yes, they're the most local demonstration of the fact that "democracy" is not an acceptable approach to decide what color I can paint my house, or what plants I can plant, or how soon after the 6am garbage pickup my garbage can has to be brought inside.

They're also, often, not even a democracy: they're a loudest-ocracy, because most people have better things to do with their time than dictate what their neighbors can do.

Destroy HOAs with fire.

To be clear, echoing a point from elsewhere in this thread: nobody should have to have an asphalt manufacturing plant next to their home. But that same premise doesn't extend to "nobody should have a house next to them with an Unapproved Paint Color".

But like I think states like Michigan should do things like get rid of townships (which end up being a redundant layer under counties given modern infrastructure and administrative capacity).

The dumbest meeting I ever went to was a township zoning discussion where one group disingenuously argued that wind towers were the worst thing that could ever happen, another group argued that they should be able to put a wind tower anywhere they want regardless of any impact on their neighbors, and a guy that liked his own voice talked about how natural gas is a conspiracy, or something like that.