As a 16-17 year old, I slept a few times at around 8000' on the Italian alps with no tent or tarp. At that stage I had never seen an alpine tent and certainly could not afford one. My sleeping bag was borrowed, heavy( made from animal hair...),and painfully inadequate. If the weather had turned nasty one of those nights, as it does at that altitude, I could have died. I had no torch and, at lest on an a couple of occasions, a way of getting off the mountain till daylight. Should I start a " all tent and tarp users are wimps!" post ?
To even mention Francis Tapon as an example is highly misleading and dangerous. He is a professional athlete, not an amateur backpacker.
Can I remind you that Reinhold Messner went up Mt Everest, by himself, without oxygen and during the monsoon season. Should I start an "all Everest climbers are wimps" thread in one of the mountaineering forums ?
As it has been pointed out, in fair weather most tents provably are too much, but If you have not heard people say "I'll never go camping again" after they have spent a bad night inside a cheap tent, you have not been camping.
Keep in mind that the original poster was stating that most tents are overpriced, not that in some cases a cheap tent will do. Also keep in mind that most people here are not just car campers, often there is no quick escape .
Franco