I've never had an HOA, but I'd imagine a big factor in people disliking them as opposed to other forms of government is the levels of pettiness and micromanaging. The HOA tells you you can't have green windowshades or have hedges more than four feet tall. The government says they'll tax your income and use it to build roads and schools.

I won't bother pointing out the problems with the government argument (I think literally every member of SN knows them). But bad a case as it is, it still comes across as a better case than the one the HOAs often make.

(In theory, of course, HOAs exist for things like ensuring the community gets trash collection and similar things, but in reality, petty rules seem to abound, and it's those that people complain about.)