The first sentence I agree is asinine, unless they want to talk about volume, which might end up being fairly close.
The second sentence is just stupid. How small is their living room? Are they hoarders? Even hoarders manage to pile huge amounts of junk in their tiny living spaces. The PS5 isn't big enough for it to be a concern of space. There's this amazing thing called the floor, where it can easily be placed if you're still using an old CRT that occupies the entire top surface of your cabinet, and if the cabinet is so tiny that it can't fit the console vertically or horizontally. These are people who'd never have been able to buy a home entertainment system, as the PS5 will be smaller than a receiver. So I wouldn't really be blaming the system, so much as the camera mount that's masquerading as a TV stand in their apartments.
There's hyperbole, and then there's the overreaction to the PS5's size. And even then, the simple answer to the situation is "shut up, and don't buy it." The design isn't going to change. No one who is going to buy it is going to care about what it looks like a week after it's connected to the TV. Anyone that owned a OG PS3 should be perfectly fine. No one's house collapsed under the immense heft of that behemoth, nor the OG Xbox (which I personally personally rank as one of the worst console designs ever). Anyone making the "not enough space" argument should be shown the exit of the thread, because they're either making shit up, or literally live in a shoe box. I've seen families of 5 living in a single room here in Asia, and even they would have space for a PS5.