Radio is optional as you can switch it off at any time, change the volume, is not imposed by the manufacturer, and you had the option to listen to your own cassetes and later CDs and digital for 50+ years.
You must not have exprienced modern vehicles. My 2013 Chysler Pacifica's factory headunit occasionally stops kicking the watchdog timer and gets rebooted. When that happens, the radio is still playing and can't be switched off or volume adjusted until the thing is done booting.
That would be the exception, not the rule with radio (that it would need to be, to justify using it as an example of a driving nuissance as the grandparent did).
And this exception points to the current trend for manufactured control + everything as a platform, so it can be seen as a further argument towards the point we're making here against this trend.
This would be an example of where more complicated isn't better. Our car is from 2004 but neither it nor any car I've ever owned has ever had this problem.
