Debian, at least until bookworm works perfectly without systemd. The easiest way to make this transition, is to installed Debian with nothing but 'standard system utilities' and 'SSH server' (if you want) during install:

https://forum.qubes-os.org/uploads/db3820/original/2X/c/c774...

Once install is done, login and save this file:

  /etc/apt/preferences.d/systemd

  # this is the only systemd package that is required, so we up its priority first...
  Package: libsystemd0
  Pin: release bookworm
  Pin-Priority: 700
  /etc/apt/preferences.d/systemd

  # exclude the rest
  Package: systemd
  Pin: release *
  Pin-Priority: -1

  Package: *systemd*
  Pin: release *
  Pin-Priority: -1

  Package: systemd:i386
  Pin: release *
  Pin-Priority: -1

  Package: systemd:amd64
  Pin: release *
  Pin-Priority: -1

After:

  apt-get install sysvinit sysvinit-core sysvinit-utils

Reboot then:

  apt-get purge systemd

There are a few edge cases, packages which require systemd, but I've been running thousands of systems including desktops this way for a decade.

Yes, I also run thousands of systems with systemd too.