Controversial opinion: the Internet didn't die, you just got left behind.
Gotta keep up. The edge of culture is always moving and trying to stay put is a guarantee that you'll miss out.
The community of memes is more varied and nuanced than leekspin ever was. There's more lowbrow comedy sure but there's more of all types of content.
If you only see shit you hate online it's your fault. Go find places you enjoy (for me that's lemmy, as an example) and teach your algorithm to stop showing you rage bait by not falling for it.
Tiktok has plenty of problems but if you teach the algorithm that the only reason you're there is absurdism and the bizarre: you'll end up with an absurd and bizarre feed.