> Just because something is a proverb, doesn't mean it's automatically true for all cases.

A professional woodcarver armed with only a metal spoon will still make a nicer woodcarving than I can given a full wood shop. Similarly, if you only give me notepad.exe, I can still make a pretty nice website.

Does using the right tools make our lives easier? For sure. Using mildly-wrong tools (react, in this case) isn't going to hold us back very much though.