I mostly agree, but...

Where you say, "If you have the patience to actually read annual reports and financial statements, do your own research," it takes more than just patience. It also takes time to educate myself about such things, and to do the requisite reading and analysis.

I'm a full-time consultant with a writing side hustle. I don't have the time to try and root out the best individual investments.

What I do have the time and patience for is identifying great mutual fund managers and invest in whatever they and their analysts think are good investments.

For nearly 20 years now, that's allowed me to beat the market by 1-2% annually (see, e.g., https://medium.com/financial-strategy/a-simple-investing-method-that-beat-the-s-p-500-for-17-years-and-counting-ed1c9980337), without spending more than a few hours on it every few months.