Honestly, I think the proliferation of civilian variants of the AR-15 changed American gun culture for the worse. That proliferation also seemed to coincide with the deterioration of the NRA from a responsible firearm organization into a right-wing superPAC, so maybe there's a chicken/egg question there.
While it is an excellent weapon system in its own right, it isn't traditionally either a target arm or a hunting arm. There are plenty of traditional gun owners, steeped in hunting, or target shooting, or even collecting, that emphasize gun safety and other aspects of responsible gun ownership that own and shoot AR-15 variants and enjoy tinkering with them.
But AR-15s also brought into the fold a bunch of big truck, freedumb-loving patriot bros and their Lauren Boobert bitchez who love to shoot up beer cans and watermelons with a fucking semi-auto, 20 or 40 round center-fire rifle. Get a fucking Marlin 60/99 or Ruger 10/22 for that shit.
There's a fairly large market for stupid accessories like bumpfire stocks for fuck's sake, that make them imitate automatic weapons and serve no purpose but to spray a bunch of inaccurate rounds at a high rate of fire. Pew, pew, pew. Most old-time hunters and target shooters think that's dumb as shit.
I bet there are a stunning number of people that own only AR-15s and variants, and maybe a handgun or two, and nothing else. No hunting rifles, no target rifles, no target pistols, no shotguns, except maybe a "street sweeper,". And I bet, if you could measure such a thing, they're very light on gun safety education, safe storage of firearms, etc.