Visits from Google to one of my independent sites have been about the same in 2022, 2023, and 2024. Visits to another have roughly doubled from year to year. I don't use Google Search or surveillance ads but I don't have the issue that they report.
AyyEye's observation that their site is loaded with trackers and what look a lot like affiliate marketing links is one reason why Google Search might not like it any more.
Stats are fine, as sometimes people mistake a single data point for a truth. Might take a look at my post as there are links as this is a huge issue affecting many many many websites.
I don't have access to your "many friends and acquaintances who are going bankrupt and shutting down fantastic independently run websites." I absolutely don't have access to the internals of their businesses to decide whether I agree that their problem is Google Search being hostile to independent sites. But I do have access to the traffic stats for the sites which I run.
Many of the sites with similar complaints seem to focus on product reviews and recommendations and have been hit by a specific Google policy which favors trusted and well-known domains for those types of search, even if that domain is not trusted for product reviews in particular. (So $glossyMagazineInNYC can open a line of product reviews and get lots of Google traffic, while $smallProductReviewBusiness loses traffic).
AyyEye's observation that their site is loaded with trackers and what look a lot like affiliate marketing links is one reason why Google Search might not like it any more.