writing them undotted is not closer than writing them dotted

Hear hear. Transcribing Harvest Home - to take an example close to my heart - you've got three choices:

1. Write it in 2-1 crotchet/quaver pairs (DUM-pa DUM-pa). This means that the triplets stop being triplets and the time signature goes to 12/8.

2. Write it in 3-1 dotted quaver/semi-quaver pairs (DUM... pa-DUM...pa). No change to the triplets or the time sig.

3. Write it in straight quavers (Dum dum, Dum dum).

As I understand it, both 1 and 2 sound something like what it's supposed to sound like. So why should we prefer option 3, which doesn't?