You make it sound like the nonsense in the TV shows and commercials, pushing the DEI and black-related topics, didn’t contribute to older Americans walking away from broadcast TV. Regardless, the younger generations want nothing to do with live TV except for sports.
Older Americans in particular took advantage of VCRs and later DVD players to watch television time-shifted and skip through ads, or watch movies that were long out of theaters.
Older Americans were satisfied with reruns in timeslots other than prime time instead of watching new shows. They could watch all their favorites without watching new television.
Adam-12
Alfred Hitchcock Presents / The Alfred Hitchcock Hour
All In The Family
Barnaby Jones
Bonanza
Cannon
Cheyenne
Combat!
Doctor Who
Dragnet
Gomer Pyle, U.S.M.C.
Gunsmoke
Have Gun - Will Travel
Hawaii Five-O
I Love Lucy
In The Heat of the Night
Leave It To Beaver
M*A*S*H*
Matlock
Maverick
Mission: Impossible
Perry Mason
Petticoat Junction
Rawhide
Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In
The Andy Griffith Show
The Avengers
The Benny Hill Show
The Big Valley
The Carol Burnett Show
The Dean Martin Show
The Dick Van Dyke Show
The Ed Sullivan Show
The Fugitive
The Honeymooners
The Jack Benny Program
The Man from U.N.C.L.E.
The Rat Patrol
The Rifleman
The Saint
The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour
The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson
The Untouchables
The Waltons
The Wild Wild West
Wanted Dead or Alive
No one wants anything to do with broadcast television which is exactly what the industry insiders predicted with the advent of the VCR.
The industry insiders didn't need to especially bright or have great knowledge. They knew it was coming because they watched their fathers go through same thing with radio. Once listeners could choose their listening and transport it easily, they were listening to broadcasts less and less. While vinyl had some transportability, it was the 8-track first and then cassettes that really lowered broadcast listening. CDs dropped it whole other level before MP3s and streaming finished it off.
In addition to other forms of viewing, television has to compete with video games. It's been almost 20 years since the sales of a single video game launch exceeded the biggest Hollywood blockbuster sales in the same year.
Television has to compete with internet and smart phone viewing. Who wants to watch a broadcast show when you can star in your own TikTok? Who wants to watch an hour of formulaic plots, time filler, and commercials when they can watch 1 minute video shorts that get right to the best parts?
There are webcasters, and not even at the level of Joe Rogan, who have more viewers than broadcast television. That started more than a decade ago.
Broadcasters are putting garbage on television just like their grandfathers did with vaudeville - at the end, attendance had dropped off so much that the only ones they could attract were deviants who got off on watching filth.