You're right, that actually tends to happen, it's easy to fall into that kind of discourse, although it doesn't necessarily make anyone's opinion more valid than anyone else’s, and quite often that kind of speech tends to be very nostalgic and distorts reality, making it hard to show an impartial opinion.

Still, for the players that experienced it, myself included, it is quite a big deal, and naturally so, but that doesn't mean that the game was better back then, on the contrary, the game has improved immensely since then. It is only normal for players that experienced it to sometimes claim that they miss certain features or actually miss the lack of them (flying mounts, 40man raids, no LFR, no content skipping, etc.).

I must admit that occasionally I say the same thing as well, but not with the intention of making my opinion seem more important, it frequently happens when I'm talking about the game’s evolution.