Using tabs has the opposite of your intended effect: If there is any text which is vertically aligned beyond the first indent, then this alignment will break for anyone who doesn't have your tab width preference. They're then forced to change their editor settings to view your file in a non-broken way. I get way more pissed about someone else "forcing their preferences on me" when this happens than when I run into a tidy, 2-space-indented file.
If you configure your editor to drop spaces when you hit 'tab', then the file is guaranteed to look the same for everyone, and stops being context-dependent-- a bad thing for plain text, IMO.
If you configure your editor to drop spaces when you hit 'tab', then the file is guaranteed to look the same for everyone, and stops being context-dependent-- a bad thing for plain text, IMO.