>>It feels like the height of arrogance and gatekeeping to look down on someone who just wants to be able to italicize or bold some text in their emails sometimes.
I really disagree with this part of your post. Plain text is just that, plain text. By definition there is no bold and no italics. We can talk about the the weird technical limitations and requirements for submitting inline patches all night if you like but I'm not sure what you are even complaining about aside from the technical limitations of plain text emails. If you think this is gatekeeping and it keeps you from expressing yourself I don't even know what to say.
I really disagree with this part of your post. Plain text is just that, plain text. By definition there is no bold and no italics. We can talk about the the weird technical limitations and requirements for submitting inline patches all night if you like but I'm not sure what you are even complaining about aside from the technical limitations of plain text emails. If you think this is gatekeeping and it keeps you from expressing yourself I don't even know what to say.