Knots proposed and has implemented a solution to rate limited Ordinals. Spam is a cat and mouse game you have to fight on the mempool level, to not drift towards censorship.
I think it's valid to say that the quantity of spam on the chain is a relevant factor and if we can reduce 99% of that it's a good outcome. It makes a difference if the network makes an effort to reduce this behavior or if it opens itself up to it with all guards down.