Some machines can detect rotated diodes, for example. So it might be possible technically. Although, for resistors, the machine would need to detect actual text including edge cases like "0". Keep in mind this will probably slow down the assembly process and increase cost. It will definitely increase setup cost, since this just isn't day-to-day routine for 99,99 % of all assembly shops. The bottom line is: Most assembly shops would happily align the resistors for you. But they will charge a fortune. Probably because most assembly shops would do this with manual rework.
That should be the norm, yes. Just do a picture search on the internet for taped SMD resistors: On most pictures you'll find that the orientation is pretty much random. Maybe some manufacturing machines will "accidentally" produce tapes with aligned orientation. But no manufacturer will guarantee this. So it just needs a change in machinery or production site and the next batch of the very same part number will have random orientation.
It would be neat, if all SMD resistors where oriented the same way. But that's simply not practical in most cases, even if you could rely on the resistors being oriented the same way in the tape. By connecting both pins of a resistor in a schematic, you also define its orientation as a byproduct without any knowledge of how it's going to be oriented on the actual board. If a resistor turns out to be in wrong orientation during layout, you would need to go back to the schematic and flip/mirror the resistor with most CAD tools. That's just a total waste of time. Remember that your footprint library can't be agnostic of the orientation, either.
tl;dr: Don't bother ;)