Probably as a result of where I grew up (rural southeastern US, 20 miles from the closest population center over 1k people). But I have never considered dandelions to be weeds. Just another interesting plant in the multitude of grasses that made up our 3 acre front yard.

Clover, dandelions, crabgrass, dallisgrass, etc were just part of our yard. We also used it often as grazing for the horses as an alternative to spending hours mowing every few weeks. So any attempt as species control would have been undone by the horse manure anyways.