Old grammarian here!

Exclamation marks are much more common these days, thanks to texting - a text ending in a period seems even rude by now.

Indeed, there's one case where the exclamation mark is classically used and you don't - it's for the imperative mood:

"Let's stop using them!" (as you say in the paragraph on hedges).

Now, you don't want to come off as too excited! Overheated! Goofy even! Yes!!! These are bad!!!

But don't beat yourself up for having imbibed the spirit of the age, and serving us up a few too many exclamation points.

(At least you aren't advocating for the interrobang, "‽"!)