Fair enough, but the fact that it seemed useful to you to explain how the scheme might in fact make sense, after an initial impression that it didn't, is not, I think unrelated to the fact that design aesthetic and gorgeous are in focal positions in:

http://www.omnigroup.com/blog/iOS-7-...new-whats-cool

with Apple's deference and clarity demoted to the end of the sentence and reframed as 'suggestions' rather than structuring design goals.

Focusing on iOS7 as a new style or decorative aesthetic (rather than as a new foregrounding of data and clarity) means giving absolute priority to a decorative scheme (a kind of mainly minimalist modernism, with proud and prominent stylistic quotes of the Tokyo metro) even if that erodes the immediate clarity of flagging, to the point where users begin share suggestions about how the new encoding of flagging might, after a while, be seen to make sense.

Frankly, going for decorative integrity at the expense of clarity is simply turning Apple's proposition upside down:

Nothing we’ve ever created has been designed just to look beautiful.

http://www.apple.com/ios/design/