I know this article is a bad source, but why do scientists and the press continue to use the provocative explanation of QM: "things don't exist unless you look at them at the quantum level."

According to QM, things don't exist until they are measured which is quite different (unless you are tied to an anthropomorphic interpretation of 'observer').

Since there is no formal definition of observer that in any way limits such to humans, an observer/measurer can in essence be any interacting particle in physics-- measurement is an interaction.

This specialist notion is so far removed from the lay-person's interpretation of an anthropomorphic observer creating reality wherever they look as to be nonsense. Especially since the intuition is likely to be applied at the non-quantum scale.

Systems of interacting particles are the norm, not the exception as our careful laboratory experiments are crafted to be.