The biggest difference with updates isn't even being forced vs "when I say so," even though it does matter.

The biggest difference for me is the whole "be good at the thing you were made to do" aspect of Linux and FOSS. I never have any hesitation to update my computer, because updates are fast and unobtrusive. At work I will run an update check in a terminal in the middle of a Teams meeting while I also have code building in the background using 100% CPU. No issues.