It’s pretty trivial to disable most animations (and more importantly transparency!). I’ve been doing that on new MacOS installs since Jaguar and it only takes a few minutes. If you want to move quickly you’re probably already using keyboard shortcuts and ignoring the dock and toolbars.

For less technically adept users (ie. most users) the animations and spacings mostly seem to help them understand what’s going on. I know everyone has their preferences, but I don’t really get the level of griping that accompanies every release.