Really? When Vitalik first used the phrase, was he referring to devs wanting to build successful experiments on bitcoin and not eth? I don't remember the context.

People argue over what it means, but it really is just leaning into an insult ethereans came up with. It's a meme that probably means very little. 

Yes, I am a maximalist. Yes, I am living a weird mountain man fantasy. 

 Read the article yourself: https://blog.ethereum.org/2014/11/20/bitcoin-maximalism-currency-platform-network-effects 

 First paragraph explains how you are wrong. Why not just admit it directly? 

 See his references: https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/2m30j6/comment/cm1bton/