stickers > just looks cheap due to different surfaces and colors

They are cheap!

To print on a piece you must run the inkjet assembly line, do QC on it.. With early Collectable Minifig series, I heard they outsourced that. I imagine inkjet lines that run all day for one piece type (maybe having changeable jigs.)

It's cheap to print a whole sheet of stickers!

Another approach that isn't so cheap is: in-mold transfer printing sheets. I learned about this at plastics shows around 2000; Apple used it on the all-in-one spotted iMac in 2001-ish.

Now since Lego ships perpetually ships 1x4s and 1x2s with black smileys or such, I guess carbon black in-mold transfer must be cost-effective. (That's a guess)

I know we're gonna be arguing taste in stickers forever.

I think that's fair, though I'm sure we would disagree on plenty of edge cases in the definition of a "display-oriented" set.

It just feels to me like AFOLs poopoo on any set for having stickers, without considering the advantages stickers have from the POV from the POV of a child with few LEGOs and fewer dollars.

I have some of those display sets and I think the stickers look fine. Yeah it's less convenient than printed pieces, but I think the complaints are significantly overblown.