I have explored technical writing a little bit. There are actually a fair amount of people that have majored in the humanities or literature of some sort. They complain about how they have to write in a dry, passive voice. If some of them had their way, the documentation would read differently.

I don't think anyone in tech writing is trying to put out bad documentation. I've read many complaints about not being given access to the device or software, being left out of license provisioning, being kept out of the loop in sprint planning and other meetings, or being told late in the documentation stage that functionality has changed. If the writers don't have access to blueprints or can't access the software, documentation doesn't get pictures. Some of the devs and engineers respond poorly to requests for screen grabs or doing other administrative work for the tech writers.

I don't think there is a simple solution here. What are the incentives and how does tech writing help or harm. In some cases, helping a tech writer is time spent away from development. Or you can blame UX issues on poor documentation to blame the tech writers.