In my personal experience, and your mileage can and will vary, I find not just with my D800, but even my D700 and cameras before it, everything is sharper when I use a monopod, with or without VR. If I do not have a monopod, I lean against a wall, lamp post, sit at a table with my elbows on top of the table, etc, etc, etc. Even with VR and even shooting at speeds at or above 1/1000th, I have always found it helps.
On the flip side of things, I have shot 4x5 film (Crown Graphic) hand held a few times in the past. So for the record, I am a guy in a glass house throwing stones.
IMO, one good thing about the D800 and other hi-resolution cameras is they are forcing people to really examine thier lenses, the way they shoot, maybe just everything about how they do photography. For what it is worth, back in the "old days of film when dinosaurs roamed the earth", or something like that (

), you would find that the first time a person tried something like Tech Pan 25 or Kodachrome 25 or any of the other, slow speed but very fine grained films that similar issues came out then. That old grainy colour 1000 ASA film sure hid a lot of problems.

I once knew a guy who bought a Leica just so he had something "worthy" of Kodachrome 25. Mind you, with hindsight, I also think the guy just wanted a Leica to begin with and would of found any excuse to buy one. Just like how today some guys on other forums will post and million page message trying to convince themselves whey they need to upgrade to the D810 from their 3 month old D800.

One last thought - none of my lenses has any VR or IS or anything like it. I use mostly Zeiss and Nikkor primes, and my one zoom, the 24-70, does not come with VR to begin with. Sold off the couple of lenses I once had that did have VR. For my part, I do not miss VR lenses at all.
good luck