I fully understand some of your points and your fears, but you need to re-think how Bitcoin dev process is done, it's not because bitcoin core is the the main implementation that it's somewhat sneaky process or problematic fundings, this is the beauty of open source code/FOSS, the rights of merging code from a repo is trivial as a result, because everyone can rebase/fork the repo and create new implementations. The ad hominem/ad personam attacks are also disgusting, no matter the position of the dev inside an open source organization. Regarding op_return it's a valid choice of relay policy rule, as there is no consensus rule as it stands, op_return was already limited at 1000kb, per maxblocksize consensus rule. op_return limit was already getting bypassed way before Core30, because the value could be rightfully changed, because implementations like Libre Relay got used, as a result it had bad effects on how the network relayed transactions (like compact blocks). Some implementations could choose different value (like knots), users are also free to modify that value, and the fact that the limit wasn't enforcable (because it was not a consensus limit). One could argue that changing such value would require a consensus change rather than a policy change but it would still require having actual consensus on the matter. In the end, anyone is free to run whatever code/implementation/versions they want. There is no contradiction here, you could run every version of Core pre 30 and it never would be an issue, you could even run Core30+ and modify op_return value (as long as the parameter is not deprecated), as you see fit. The consensus is made by all parties users/nodes by their economic weight/miners/exchanges. This is why BIP110 activation is missguided because it's controversial enough to not have "rough" consensus, nor being adopted, it has not enough miner signaling, BIP9 required 95% of blocks being signaled by miners, let alone the ridiculous 55% of BIP110 minimum requirement, and now flag day activation which clearly shows how reckless it is, and will inevitably result in a chain split which will end up in a difficulty reset = a hard fork, which will result in an altcoin. So in the end, even if it started somewhat from good intentions, this "fight" went way too far, maybe because of bad communication from both sides, maybe from lack of understanding of Bitcoin and FOSS process , and resulted in an autoimmune disease, that will have bad outcome for those who pursue it.