Is there a wrong way to play minecraft?

The only wrong way to play Minecraft is by joining a multiplayer server and greifing everyone

as long as you're having fun, and not hurting anyone, I consider what you're doing fine

Its a sandbox game. You don't need to adhere to any rules, and cheats are non-existent.

Only applies to singleplayer games.

The gatekeeping or whatever some people do about minecraft is crazy to me. There are countless ways to play the game and none of them are cheating. Usually cheating involves messing with the game code but modding is encouraged in minecraft, lol.

Well yes and no. Cheating is obviously very wrong. And griefing, we could say if its not protected then its ok to grief?

If it's your world do what you want honestly.

If it's a server you folllw their rules.

I'm a fan of true pure vanilla, but even I would say that your last line - that if you are showing stuff off to people you explain it wasn't pure survival - defines it as perfectly fine. I think the only thing that tends to annoy people like me is when people claim pure vanilla when it isn't, this is when you start hearing people talk about "cheating" and such.

But there is nothing objectively wrong with playing anyway you like - the game exists to have fun with. Hell, if your favorite way to play the game is to load up music discs in creative and just use dancing parrots as a screensaver, there is nothing WRONG with it!