Thank you for putting up this thread!
You really hit the nail on the head for the real problem a lot of these changes are causing - missing the mark entirely on preserving the spirit/personality for a lot of people's characters.I think a lot of the more elevated emotional response is also born from the fact that every live letter we were constantly reassured that things are not going to be drastically changed and that spirit would have special care taken for it and yet here we are.
To compound it even further these are changes brought to a community who is more invested in their character , than frankly any other MMORPG community I've ever been apart of. Every single person who's distraught is a person who's spent hundreds ,if not thousands of hours, looking at that face in cutscenes, screenshots, as a reference while drawing them or just idling while waiting for the raid timer. So every small detail is exceptionally scrutinized and how much all of them contribute to a character's personality. And quite frankly , I don't understand why some people are being straight up heartless towards those expressing their sadness over losing things like that and trying to fight for it by providing feedback.
Many of the changes feel like they are done with disregard for the original stylistic choices made for certain features to be what they are - plumper or more defined lips being flattened (rip viera lips) ,noses becoming shorter or looking smaller because the nostrils are more smoothened out or the philtrums looking changed ,eye shapes changing due to make up changes or new eyelash extensions - the list goes on and for whoever is interested there's already plenty of threads about every single one. It doesn't feel like a "graphical update" more than it feels like a weird personal stylistic choice of whoever made the change. Beauty is in the of the beholder and a lot of people who liked their more sharp or angular Au'ra might not be ok with seeing theirs literally get sanded down and more smooth , just as one example. I very much understand some of these things can be due to lighting changes but most certainly not all of them.

The graphical updates for the clothes and the world as a whole look lovely and I genuinely appreciate the effort and care that went into those , and for some it was sorely needed! But it really feels like they fumbled the bag when it comes to characters for people who were just not looking for that instagram filter look. I think the suggestion I've seen on other threads of just releasing the character creator as it is earlier could've alleviated some of these problems or at the very least have given us reason to voice earlier to just add new options that we can use instead of completely sacrificing old ones.

Here's to hoping that they address at least some of the feedback!