> I would happily admit there is extensive room for improvement in systemd, but we UNIX folks have been working with worse-is-better and rough-consensus-and-running-code for decades.

You're understanding "worse is better" backwards. It means "starkly simple to the point of being initially off-putting is better". In this context, it means (in part) "be a big boy and learn how to write a shell script". (Not to be too condescending, but I think that captures the Unix perspective here.)