Respectfully disagree. My point is that it should be easy and intuitive to do things like this while driving, just like anything else such as adjusting HVAC controls, operating turn signals, shifting gears, etc. Most major controls and operations should be tactile and easily understandable even if you have never driven that particular car before. I believe that drivers feel more distracted by modern vehicles’ UI/UX than ever before, and I rented a BMW last year that perfectly exemplifies this. It was a nightmare of unintuitive screens and menus just to do basic things - actively driving or not. It really turned me off to BMWs.

I used to drive a Camry where on the factory radio, bass and treble had individual knobs and you could adjust them without taking your eyes off the road. Oh, those were the days.

I imagine that makes having the settings be specific to each source even worse. How else are you going to adjust them for navigation instructions?

My car has something like that, but thankfully I have only needed to adjust volume, which can be done from the steering wheel…

but I'm not driving - my wife is. Thus I should be able to mess with those settings

I fully agree with you on this. If the car is moving you shouldn't really do anything more than previous/next/volume. And of those they should be on the steering wheel.

You want to mess with your equalizer, do it when stopped. IDGAF if it's dozens of physical buttons and knobs and sliders or hidden in menus; you're supposed to be driving not mastering an audio file.