Services that might not require you to expose your real identity to the whole internet, that might not exfiltrate your full contact list from your phone or would not apply questionable morals and censorship on the content you exchange with your loved ones.
My parents ans I live on different continents and we still manage to speak regularly, share pictures, etc. All of that without any of us having a Facebook account.
I can manage fine by seeing friends and family in person. If you can't, maybe you just don't care enough?
A messenger app brings people together. Such an app doesn't need an algorithmic feed to hook people on junk/harmful content. That was added for one reason, money.