This discussion should not invoke cabal. It is irrelevant. The discussion, if it were to remain faithful to the original claim, is contrasting stack against not stack.
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The other reason stack is unfortunate, is that before it existed, there was really excellent discussion about how to properly solve the build problem, in general, for which we all know cabal (and many others) are problematic.
Stack just made it a political game. It also solves no meaningful problems, except "but it's not cabal!" You can tell that's its only goal because every time I write "fuck stack", someone invokes cabal. I congratulate programmers on this achievement.