On one hand, you're partially right: It's a pretty sad state of affairs that our only choices in the previous election were "maybe let's not elect a fascist" and a fascist. I can totally agree with you that I would have loved an option that was "let's make life better".
On the other hand, what does it say about our society that given those two options, we picked the Fascist? It's not like the messaging from the Republicans was unclear: they ran on a platform of attacking the rights of women, LGBTQ+ people, and immigrants. And more than 30% of the citizens of our country said "sounds good. Count me in". Another 30-odd% decided it didn't really matter to them one way or the other. Only 30-something-percent of Americans said "wow, that's kinda fucked up. Let's not do that".
I don't think people who voted for Harris thought "yeah, let's keep healthcare pro corporate and screw the poor", they voted for other stuff. And I think people who voted for Trump didn't vote specifically against LGBTQ+ policies necessarily.
Of course, media and social media had a heavy influence, but on everybody.
The coworkers I felt comfortable asking why they voted for Trump came out of the gate with some variation on "no pretend girls in girls sports and locker rooms". To some of them being gay is apparently "just something pedos do". Plenty of people voted against lgbtq+ rights explicitly. But beyond that we are all stupid on the issues, and to some extent that is unavoidable. We can't all be experts in economics. So we can't vote on issues, we need to vote on character. When faced with a wolf in sheep's clothing and a wolf, pick the one still pretending. At least pretending to feel shame about corruption sends the message that it is wrong.
On the other hand, what does it say about our society that given those two options, we picked the Fascist? It's not like the messaging from the Republicans was unclear: they ran on a platform of attacking the rights of women, LGBTQ+ people, and immigrants. And more than 30% of the citizens of our country said "sounds good. Count me in". Another 30-odd% decided it didn't really matter to them one way or the other. Only 30-something-percent of Americans said "wow, that's kinda fucked up. Let's not do that".