The K8s is unnecessary meme is perpetuated by people that don’t understand it.
You might not need it is the kernel of doubt that can undermine any reasonable option. And it suggests nothing. Sure, you can go write your own kernel! You can make your own database! You might not need to use good well known proven technology that people understand and can learn about online! You can do it yourself! Or cobble together some alternate lesser special stack that just you have distilled out.
We don't need civilization. We can go it alone & do our own thing, leave behind shared frames of references. But damn, it just seems so absurdly inadvisable, and it feels so overblown the fear uncertainty & doubt telling us Kubernetes is hard and bad and too much. This article does certainly lend credence to the idea that Kubernetes is complex, but there's so many simpler starting places that will take many teams very far.
Like maybe one of those things is more important. than, the other
But very few other options exist that have the same scope scale & extensibility, that allow them to become broadly adopted platform infrastructure. The folks saying you might not need Kubernetes, in my view, do a massive disservice by driving people to fragmentedly piece by piece constructing their own unique paths, rather than being a part of something broader. In my view theres just too many reasons why you want your platform to be something socially prevalent, to be well travelled by others too, and right now there are few other large popular extensible platforms that suit this beyond Kubernetes.
Tractors are also unnecessary. Plenty of people grow tomatos off their balcony without tractors.
If somebody insists on growing 40 acres of tomatos without a tractor because tractors aren't necessary, why argue with them? If they try to force you to not use a tractor, that's different.
How Kubernetes works is pretty simple, but administering it is living a life of constant analysis paralysis and churn and hype cycles. It is a world built by companies that have something to sell you.