It is interesting that someone was weirded-out about you fielding a painted army.
Typically something of that nature is that they feel embarrassed.
Anyway, yes painted is preferred, looks alone why not like it?
I am recovering from some rather involved and heated talks of this nature:
http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/0/650417.page
http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/0/618783.page
http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/0/611325.page
http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/0/420990.page
As shown, it comes up quite often and both groups get quite upset with each other (I found myself getting riled-up so I cannot claim I too was not to blame).
Trying for a middle of the road approach:
1) A newly assembled army (like just released) should not be commented on, they want to play NOW!
2) A brand-new player may not have the skills and be figuring out their options: not much point in worrying about it, better yet, inspire with your own painted.
3) Progress with their armies should promote tolerance, it is nice to see them progress!
4) The quality of the paint job is not quite as important as the effort that went into it: we are all learning and if they have "good coverage" it is a plus.
Where I personally get I guess you could say "fed-up" is the same or different "grey legion" is fielded and you just know they have no plans to go further.
The bare minimum is expended to play a game.
The source of my problem for this is anyone outside of the game who views these bare plastic models being pushed around would think it is a rather ugly and uninspiring game.
I will not go further unless asked something directly but the "circular" arguments these discussions tend to get into are unhelpful.