I don't really use FB all that much these days, because the people I care to keep up with have largely moved on from it. But when i do log in, I get mostly the experience you want with the https://www.fbpurity.com/ chrome plugin I've spent the time to heavily customize.
My timeline shows as strictly chronological, and only text and photos posted by my immediate friends. No groups, ads, publisher's bullshit, promoted things, no trending, no nothing. Just photos and plain text.
Yep, back when I still used Facebook, I used that extension. I think that installing a third-party extension is probably a lot more than the average person knows to do, though. I was mostly making a point that if Facebook finds discussion over politics and the like too divisive for their internal company chat, maybe they should consider what they can do for the rest of us to keep things similarly sane.
My timeline shows as strictly chronological, and only text and photos posted by my immediate friends. No groups, ads, publisher's bullshit, promoted things, no trending, no nothing. Just photos and plain text.