Have you ever followed citations before? In my experience, they don't support what is being citated, saying the opposite or not even related. It's probably only 60%-ish that actually cite something relevant.

I follow them a lot. I’ve also had cases where they don’t support the paper.

This doesn’t make it okay. Bad human writer and reviewer practices are also bad.

Well yes, but just because that’s bad doesn’t mean this isn’t far worse.