This…all of it. I started with Arch using Manjaro, like so many do. There was a mass exodus that exploded, and the worst lot remained on the dev team. Beyond that, as you stated, they convice their users that holding back packages is for their benefit, when in reality, your system becomes unstable at times as a result, especially becoming out of sync with AUR. It is still one of the most popular Arch distros, and …well…I feel sorry for their uninformed users who believe it is a stable choice.