Comment by jbstack

What you mean is that you don't find ASCII diagrams useful. Other people do (see other comments). I find them useful for Org Mode where I prefer to work with just text instead of having to keep separate image files together with my .org files. They're also easier to work with if you need to check them into a Git repo and you don't want to be bothered with something like Git LFS or git-annex. The fact that there are people who want them is enough to explain "why there's a push toward" them (assuming there is actually such a push).