You can petition all you want, but it won't happen. The limited ability to easily customize the UI's look was implemented at the request of corporate IT departments. The rest of us get to suffer. Google "user voice Word" for the place to petition.

It turns out that the ribbon interface does have some very nice customization available, just not through the user interface.
Modifying the QAT in Microsoft Word
Customize the Ribbon (It doesn't take rocket science)
RibbonX: Customizing the Office Ribbon by Robert Martin, Ken Puls, and Teresa Hennig

If you put a custom menu on a ribbon tab, it can be moved to the QAT even if the ribbon tab is not visible.