I think some of it boils down to indoctrination. I grew up during the heyday of the television westerns ….
Yes, but indoctrination goes a couple different ways. Actually met Roy Rodgers once, and the fellow who played Festus on Gunsmoke, though I'd have to look up his name now...hell getting old ain't it?
But while I had countless toy SAs and cap guns, never got to learn a real one until I got a Blackhawk in 1983. My Dad had 1911s, and S&Ws he never liked the SA grip, so he didn't own any. So the guns I got to learn on didn't include any Single Action revolvers.
When I got my own, a 7.5" New Model Ruger Blackhawk convertible .45 Colt /.45ACP I fell in love. Not because John Wayne or any other cowboy carried one, but because it was such a sweet gun. Coil Springs, adjustable sights, safe to carry with all 6 loaded, no need to half cock to load or unload. Always felt the Ruger was the gun Colt would have made, if only they'd known how...
AND, because I began with a Blackhawk, I never had any special reverence for the Colt, or copies.
There's a lot of people who don't get it. They want a shot every time they pull the trigger, as fast as they can pull the trigger and a gun that doesn't empty until they get tired of pulling the trigger. Today's semis just about do that. But there some of us who want each shot a deliberate act, repeating a few AIMED shots rather than speed shooting multiple rounds.
It gives me definite pleasure "yarding back the hammer" for each shot. Some of us get pleasure from operating the mechanism, along with the end result. One might consider it
Schiessenvergnugen.
Its not a combat thing, its not a race thing, it a joy of shooting thing. And, its a connection with HISTORY. People still shoot muzzle loaders too. And lever guns, and ..and...gasp! Single shots!
Even if my Rugers aren't "period correct" for the old west, for me its close enough and more effective. I also enjoy driving a good standard transmission car. More work than an automatic, but somehow, worth it, most of the time.