It really isn't. Most of my work is done in R and I need to be able to compile packages for both my own work and sometimes to use the latest features of other packages. Pretty much every big R and macOS release has resulted in SOMETHING breaking. It was Apple's choice to disable openMP in clang on macOS, Apple's choice to to enable hardened runtime forcing me to manually install R binaries that aren't notarized so I can actually debug my crap, Apple's choice to move the C++ headers again, etc. Apple's choice to require GDB to be signed to do anything with it. It just ate up tremendous amounts of my time for Apple's reasons.

Then you have other poor choices to deal with like being the only OS with no support for MTP out of the box, and most mind bogglingly can't even adjust volume of HDMI/DP devices.

I do not believe they meant only that it was more customizable. I understand the feeling that your computer works for Apple instead of working for you. I think that is what he meant by Linux feeling like “my machine” and the Mac feeling like “Apple’s home”. I feel the same.

I don't mean customization - I prefer to leave things as they are, for the most part, since all that work gets lost whenever you switch to your next machine.

I mean that Apple has grown steadily more opinionated about how "their" machines ought to be used, and not in ways that suit me. Every new version of MacOS requires me to struggle through a bunch of new stuff I don't need or want before I can get back to using the machine the way I'm used to. I don't want to create an Apple account, I don't want iCloud backup, I don't want to use an app store, and I can't stand the constant barrage of notifications blinking away in the corner of the screen. I don't want Apple to protect me from running the application I just downloaded a minute ago, and I really don't want Apple to protect me from using applications they haven't approved and cryptographically signed... On it goes. I understand why they think all this stuff matters, but I have different priorities. I don't need Apple to manage my digital life, and I wish they'd stop trying to force me into their groove.