A useful model for thinking about this stuff is Black Markets. That is, restrictive rule sets, especially ones that restrict normal human desires, usually increase and incentivize worse behavior than they set out to prevent. I think this is what's playing out in bitcoin right now. By excessively restricting bitcoin script, it limits bitcoin's utility for earnest bitcoin-as-money usage, renders earnest usage uncompetitive with exploitative use, and makes perversion of bitcoin more profitable.

So, with a gun to my head today, I'd prefer we activate GSR and just make bitcoin script more expressive.

Inscriptions were possible before Taproot. Given my thinking above, it's not important what exactly made inscriptions technically possible. I'm more concerned with what makes inscriptions profitable and it's largely that there's not enough demand for blockspace that outstrips storing terrible art.