You are, sadly, absolutely correct here.
We are pushing for ranked choice voting[1], which is slowly gaining acceptance in the public consciousness.
I don't think most people here were even aware of the complexities of the electoral system until the 2016 election (when, for example, millions of people in NY could not vote for Bernie Sanders because they were required to register a year in advance as Democrats to participate in that election - so first-time voters were effectively excluded -- and it was a NY-specific rule; primaries are effectively unregulated on a federal level).
With ranked-choice voting, the hope is that people will be able to vote for candidates that represent them without fear of "the other side" prevailing. Unsurprisingly, the two-party system is quite reluctant to introduce changes that threaten it.
[1]https://ballotpedia.org/Ranked-choice_voting_(RCV)
