I think housing advocates are simply advocating for cheaper rents and more affordable, better housing, and environmentalists are advocating for walkable communities. It's not necessary to build a 20+ story tower to achieve these things. You could have a compact walkable community that houses a lot of people with 4-6 story buildings too (I mean Paris is..).
I'm not really expressing a preference here, but in my comment noting that with the Grand Bargain it's not likely to result in the outcome of a broad amount of low density apartments, but rather the situation of extremes where you have ultra low density single family houses and then in slivers of downtown where apts are allowed, ultra tall 20+ story residential towers. This is commonly seen in Toronto and Vancouver.
I think the criticism is it leads to not enough housing being built.
If the city needs 10,000 new homes a year to keep up with population growth, and I support building 10 new blocks of 100 apartments downtown but oppose everything else, am I a hero or a villain?
You seem to say that in a negative tone? Isn't increasingly dense exactly what most housing advocates wish for?