“iOS like” is not meant to be an insult. I’ve spent a considerable amount of time using GNOME and I find that iPadOS is its closest analogue — to me, it feels like what you’d get if someone were tasked with taking iPadOS and making it workable for desktop usage. There are a great deal of similarities between the two.
Fair enough! I've never used iPad OS so I wouldn't really have any means of evaluating that it, but the way you frame it seems perfectly reasonable, since it seems like you're granting that GNOME is at least adapted for desktop use. I definitely have seen that statement leveled in a dismissive way, though, quite possibly by people who have never used iPad OS or even regular iPhone OS, so I was assuming it was that again :P
