I have also seen plenty of miserably 'C' littered with indiscriminate global variables:
Every Tom, Dick & Harry function can poke about with it and nobody really knows what effect a small change in one function might have due to unexpected interactions with all the others!

As with anything, there needs to be a proper perspective and balance here:
on the one hand, indiscriminate use of globals leads to the kinds of problems just mentioned;
on the other hand, blind adherence to the "no globals" mantra can be just as foolish - leading to the jumping of hoops that you mention!