USB always had it, this isn't just what they came up with for USB-C. Panasonic Toughbooks have that single screw versions and matching gasket countersinking for USBs.
It just works. Proper screws just work. Latches has its own pros and cons, button-less latches like USB are technically even worse. It's just collective memory of cheapest parodies of these for VGAs never working that you have internalized.
I don't know about that. They were pretty bad for not just VGA but serial ports, parallel ports, SCSI and ZIP drives, etc. The screws would never fit all the way in, the holes would be misaligned, cheap plastic would get in the way, they'd often be stripped, etc. They were nightmarish enough for desktops that rarely moved or got unplugged. I would never want something like that in a mobile form factor. Apple was right to go proprietary here. The screw locks sucked.
Apple would be free to work on "more elegant" common standards instead of trying to force people into their ecosystem by using proprietary garbage, which then has to be forbidden by the EU yet again.