The blame for this is 100% on Google.

They constantly reward websites that are on a hamster-wheel of chasing the latest SEO trends, while penalizing websites that have actual information for not jumping through the same hoops.

A company I know operated TWENTY THOUSAND blogspam blogs out of a single server/IP. Google knew all along that this was happening (the companies had strategic partnerships) and never did anything about it.

The last thing they did anything significant was when, Panda in 2011?

At this point it's clear they're a monopoly and only care about websites who cater to their whims + making money. Search be damned.