When I say I want to be a Generalist, I mean 0% in all affinities, jack of all trades-master of none sort of thing. But perhaps I am too paranoid about the disadvantages, affinities take quite awhile to shift anyways.
You're better off aiming for 100% arcane if you want 0% in everything(casting any spell will boost your affinity to the spell's affinities).
And yes, you guys are paranoid. Unless you're at full depth in an affinity, you are very unlikely to even notice either the passive benefits or drawbacks(except for Life and Ender which it's pretty clean when they are at 50% or so). And aside from a few basic drawbacks to every affinity, most of the time the benefit is greater then the drawbacks(except for Life and Ender which both are hell once they drawbacks kick in IMO). So what if your water affinity is at 100%? A trip to the nether will reduce your health by 4 hearts(or was it life and thus half-hearts?) while your there,
big deal. So what if you get hungry quicker without an open sky with 100% Plant. Get some light and you are fed like the tree you might as well be. Oh noes, my Arcane depth is high enough that I'm now weaker to magic. Oh well, I guess I should put on my mage robes when going out then. I keep getting struck by lightning with my max Lightning Affinity! Wasn't there some weird cross mod exploit or another that involved getting struck by lightning, let me double check... Oh yeah, free Nether Stars for Everyone!
And even the drawbacks to Life are pretty tame. Oh noes, I get sick when I kill something! Man, maybe I'll wait for it to wear off and let my health regenerate regardless of how hungry.
Ender though, uh, kinda sucks. I hope I'm not too rough on it, but there are 3 drawbacks at 2 benefits, which isn't very ideal anyway since most affinities have 2 benefits and 1 drawback, and the benefits are 40% poison resistance at 100% depth and somewhere around 50% you get night vision when it's dark enough. Wow, gee, that really makes it worth the pain when I go out in the sun, go for a swim, or get rained on, eh?