I certainly don’t think the ranks are meaningless, there’s a reason I stay in plat, sometimes I reach diamond and sometimes I drop to high gold but I always end back up at mid to high plat because obviously that’s where I belong. I just find it difficult to play in a game with lower ranks, maybe it’s because I expect certain things from them that they can’t live up to. For example I expect a Dva to deal with a hitscan on high ground, I expect a rein to move forward rather than just stand in a choke for his shield to deplete, I expect Anna to be able to land most of her healing shots, or I expect zen to use his healing orb, I often dont get these basic functions from my team mates in bronze/silver so I think you have to play differently. one needs to learn to carry in a very different way… in a way that wouldn’t work out in my regular rank.
Another thing I noticed is that Different heroes work better too down there. I can do well as Dva at my regular rank but I don’t get enough healing in silver games so I pick zarya and just melt everyone. But in plat the zarya doesn’t work nearly as well because they have soldiers and other hitscan that know how to use high ground advantage. I have to laugh when silver players get upset if you aren’t picking OWL/GM Meta heroes, as if that has any relevance to any of these ranks (including mine).