Could you link to it? And does the Rabbi explain there why on these topics he never brings the opposing view (in clear contrast to the Meiri’s way everywhere else in his commentary)?

I didn’t address Hillman’s arguments, but that’s quite a weak objection. He doesn’t always bring all the positions, and I’m also not sure there was anyone who explicitly said things against his approach (after all, he was speaking about his own surroundings).
The link to my article:

האם יש עבודה זרה ‘נאורה’? על היחס לגויים ועל שינויים בהלכה

There definitely are things against his approach. Rabbi Hillman even brings an example where a rabbi who was the Meiri’s colleague in Provence wrote what the Meiri writes and said explicitly that it was merely a response to the heretics, nothing more. And in general, he does almost always bring the opposing view, especially when it comes to Maimonides. True, the Rabbi tried to read his approach into Maimonides, but in my opinion that attempt failed, because Maimonides explicitly says about the Christians of his time that they are idol worshipers in every respect, and that is one of the places where the Meiri does not cite Maimonides as disagreeing.
And in general, the article there has a comparison that doesn’t seem balanced to me at all, between people walking in the desert with summer clothes and their children, and the Meiri’s approach to midrashic continuity. There the doubt itself is strange; and although there is no clear source, the forefathers are presumed to have walked in short clothes when it was hot, like everyone else, and we have no reason to suspect they had hidden reasons for doing so. By contrast, we have no presumption that the Torah commands commandments that sound moral and reasonable to us in everything related to the relation between man and God (idolatry). As for the Torah, we know that very often there are hidden reasons, if any at all, and “scriptural decree” is not exactly rare. So in my opinion the comparison is difficult.
In addition, the Meiri’s approach is difficult even on its own terms. After all, a Jew who worshiped idolatry even one single time, with witnesses and warning, is liable to death, even if he merely bowed down and is still perfectly fine personality-wise (and maybe even later fully repented). And there certainly are examples of the sin of idolatry being called that even when the transgressors are completely fine people, even if he is completely fine (as in the sin of the Golden Calf). So is the definition different for a gentile? Or is there nowadays no transgression at all in worshiping idols? I don’t think that claim passes the test of examples.
By the way, I also find it hard to believe that the Sages were unfamiliar with enlightened idol worshipers. Some of the Sages had gentile friends (Avlat was Shmuel’s friend, Antoninus was Rabbi’s friend, and so on).

Rabbi Michi, what do you mean, he was speaking about his own surroundings? In all the discussions of the medieval authorities (Rishonim) and later authorities (Acharonim) regarding gentiles, whether they distinguish between gentiles who are idol worshipers and whether they do not, they speak about gentiles in general, not about specific gentiles from a certain area. That is, they do not distinguish between gentiles living in certain regions and gentiles living in another region. And the Meiri too, as one of the early authorities, does not make such a distinction.

Rational,
That’s not correct. If you read the Meiri’s words, you’ll see that he distinguishes between gentiles who are bound by the norms of the nations and other gentiles.

House,
Do you really want to argue that the Meiri was supposed to bring every view of someone who lived in Provence? Am I supposed to answer such a strange claim? We have a dispute about the facts. The Meiri does not always bring opposing views. Especially if he doesn’t see them as a disagreement with his own approach. As I argued there, Maimonides does not disagree with him. On the contrary, a source for his words can be brought from Maimonides. The fact that Maimonides held that they are idol worshipers—I explained in my article that the Meiri does not disagree with that. Are you sure you read the article?
I have nothing to answer to your claims about the swimsuit-clothing analogy. It is exactly the same thing. And again, I am not talking about the question whether those gentiles are idol worshipers.
And regarding what the Sages knew, exceptions are not relevant to us. We are talking about the presumption regarding the average gentile.

And finally, the discussion about the Meiri is not important, because I would say this on the basis of my own reasoning even without the Meiri. The reasoning is correct, whether the Meiri said it or not.