It perhaps shows how successful the trolly experiment has been, playing its part in changing our cultural attitudes as a whole, since its' purpose (lately, I dunno about originally) was to get people to realize exactly what you just said: that choosing to do nothing is still a choice. Sort of a "wake up, sheeple!" message.

Older generations like Boomers and especially Great before that were ignoring climate change and so much else - not having access to the internet, knowledge was more difficult to come by back then.

Today's era involves different struggles, mainly against misinformation, but at least people more often have their eyes open.

Edit: NSFW video version from the TV show The Good Place that adds some new dimensions to the problem: https://youtu.be/DtRhrfhP5b4?si=zI6lV0G_VRhzjz97.:-)