Instead of being "bad," I consider ActivityPub as not being mature yet.
Other internet protocol like HTTP or email are also really basic on its early inception, but it later adding so many features and capabilities to be more modern and flexible.
Give it enough time, and ActivityPub will be mature enough for varied use cases.
Every social media is collective of thousands of social bubbles.
While I advocating for federated SNS, I personally rarely encounter any toxicity on internet except when I interact with westerner (especially Americans). I carefully choose who I follow and interact, and the algorithm are trained with my interaction to put content that not toxic and relevant to me.
On fediverse alone, I have multiple account that delivers entirely different social experience. My English mastodon.social account that just slightly touch Western politics are thousands times toxic. Even my personal regional political discourse feed on Twitter, Instagram, or Facebook are not as toxic as Western politics on fediverse.