I haven't used R enough in the last 10 years to have an R-specific opinion. And to be honest it was more an unlearned statement on my part as it was an "ew, Excel" response and not thinking about the underlying workflow.

In the intervening time I've become a large advocate for the pattern of chained operators. So I'd imagine I'd enjoy piping in R. And if that means I'm emulating a common Excel workflow, that's fine. I won't have the childish response of "ew, Excel" :)