It sounds like your chief reason for wanting to switch games is less about mechanics, and more about the player base. If so, then yeah going OSR is probably a good move. The OSR scene is mostly made up of two types of players: old veterans who just want to play the way the game they used to, and newer players dissatisfied with the direction mainstream roleplaying is going in. In either case, the scene tends to vary between non-woke and actively anti-woke. In general, I find that the less popular a game is, the higher the average player quality is. The act of seeking out obscure or independent games to play pretty much requires that someone have a passion for the hobby in and of itself. People who view roleplaying as a vehicle for political messaging or self-indulgence usually won't go to the extra effort.
If you hang around this forum for a while, you'll get dozens of OSR games recommended to you. Mechanically, they're all pretty similar to each other, so it's really just a question of which features you do or don't want in your version of D&D. From what I've seen, the following games seem to have the largest numbers of people actively playing them.
--Old School Essentials: Pretty much the premier Basic D&D retroclone. Good if you want a game which is very simple and easy to use.
--Castles and Crusades: A bit of a mishmash of 3rd and 1st edition AD&D. Probably the easiest game to pick up if you are familiar with 3rd-5th edition.
--Lamentations of the Flame Princess: Another Basic D&D retake. best known for its horror aesthetic and extensive library of modules.
--Dungeon Crawl Classics: Like Castles & Crusades, a game that combines old-school playing styles with newer design sensibilities, but with an added dose of weirdness and a fondness for random tables.
--Hyperborea (formerly known as Astonishing Swordsmen and Sorcerers of Hyperborea): an AD&D based game. Uses THAC0, but popular for it's wide variety of class options and well developed pulp science-fantasy setting.
--ACKS: This is the one I know least about, but it appears to be another AD&D based game, and it does get recommended around here quite a lot.
Here are some non-OSR games which also get a lot of recommendations:
--Barbarians of Lemuria: A rules-lite, low magic sword-and sorcery game. Not strictly OSR, but in the same spirit. Most people will recommend the Mythic Edition over the base game.
--Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay 2nd edition: Generally regarded as the best WFRP edition. The current (4th) edition is pretty well liked as well, but as it is a current mainstream game, you may encounter the same player types you do in 5th edition D&D.
--Mythras: A spinoff of 6th edition Runequest (much like the way Pathfinder was from 3.5). Designed to be much more setting-neutral than Runequest itself, and still being supported by the publisher.
--Talislanta: A relatively rules-lite science fantasy game. Known for it's unique world setting, large number of race/class options, and the fact that the author makes most editions of it available for free on his website.
--D6 games: I don't know much about these, so someone else will have to fill in the details. West End Games Star Wars in particular seems to have a rabid following.
Traveller: Generally regarded as the premier hard science-fiction game. Around here, most people are playing "Classic Traveller", but the most recent edition from Mongoose publishing seems to be well-reviewed as well.