Quoting Simon Hobson (linux@???):

[snip much]

> And like it or not, for this very large group of people, the "desktop"
> needs to be familiar enough (ie look and work like Windows) for them
> to be able to carry on with their trial and error prodding to get
> things done.

The part you didn't address is where a DE is even helpful for this.
It's not.

You've argued for a novice-friendly assemblage of good grapical
applications (in such use-cases), not for a DE.

In any event, your concern appears irrelevant to the original querent,
who appears not to be such a user.