I think in real usage (in my experience), this is very rarely the case. The only thing Generics are really extremely useful for is writing data structures that you can re-use with multiple data types.

Also, I tend to appreciate Go's approach of writing more code in these situations, because in general the code is still far more readable than a C++ Template (for example).

The Go creators have not ruled out adding Generics, they are simply being very careful about how they implement it. I would rather have this situation than something like a generic Java/C#/C++ style generics implementation rammed in because it is demanded by people who have hardly touched the language (or refuse to touch it until said feature is added).