It is a bit of gatekeeping that has little relation with reality.
When people say that their home is heated by natural gas, they mean that they have a supply of natural gas, and that is the consumable they use / pay for, not the specific chemical process when it is oxidized. Similarly, when people say they heat their home with electricity, whether it's a heat pump or electric radiators is just a secondary possibility. I heat my home with electricity and it's a ground-source heat pump. If someone has some weird hangup or ignorance about that, that's on them.
If someone said that they cooled their home in the winter with "electricity assistance" I think everyone would rightly laugh.
When people say that their home is heated by natural gas, they mean that they have a supply of natural gas, and that is the consumable they use / pay for, not the specific chemical process when it is oxidized. Similarly, when people say they heat their home with electricity, whether it's a heat pump or electric radiators is just a secondary possibility. I heat my home with electricity and it's a ground-source heat pump. If someone has some weird hangup or ignorance about that, that's on them.
If someone said that they cooled their home in the winter with "electricity assistance" I think everyone would rightly laugh.