Exactly right. Have you ever been to someone's fish fry who made hush puppies that "looked right" but had no onions in them? I have! It's just so wrong! And it has happened to me more than once. I don't get it.
Also, those odd-shaped ones in the BBQ picture are like the ones they serve at Red Lobster. They smell so good and then you bite into one and it has fake onion in it. Not even the kind that plumps up from dehydrated to like normal white onion pieces - these are little flecks of dark green something that is an herb, I think - I think the onion "flavor" is from powder.
As with all fried foods - the grease makes all the difference.
An onionless hushpuppy is an abomination unto the Lord, and it is vile and wretched in His sight. You are correct to condemn it.