I am one of the lucky ones who found a therapist who knew what he was doing, so I have a soft spot for the profession, but I recognize the vast problems you mention; it’s somewhat of a lottery and it’s designed to bring you back to “Work”. In my opinion the system needs to integrate matching clients with therapists in a holistic way, like a shamanic model where healers can only heal what they’ve healed themselves to properly develop empathy and understand the subjective states the client is going through, or through personality type matching a like MBTI or the Big Five. My therapist knew the anxiety and gut issues I was going through (repressed trauma) because he had gone through them himself, making a connection easy to establish.

In short, therapy can work, but most of the time it doesn’t because of inability for clients to find good or matching therapists. Everything you mention is true why therapy has such problems actually healing people and you were definitely right to leave the trainwreck therapists you saw, but there is hope and I think the culture is changing attitudes slowly. My two cents.