Perhaps, but folks buying used PC's loaded with heavily mangled Windows 95 is no picnic, either.
Windows is fine. If you follow the simple rule that no one gives you anything for free. So when you get that pop-up on the Internet that says it will do something really cool, help your male performance or save you a lot of money if you just click here, you should not click there.
Otherwise all the fixes that everyone describes wouldn't be necessary.
But, it's human nature to foul it up. My buddy has his computer beside his front window. He was having trouble with a spy ware program called weather bug. I asked him why he installed it on his computer. He said so he would know the weather. Again, it was by his front window! If he wanted to know the weather, he should look out the window!
Spam is worst by an order of magnitude. And that's independent of platform.
The new user should by the Dell and Norton and not worry about it.