What about scenes that aren't lit? I rode splash mountain 4 times over a week period and every time there were scenes that were dark. You couldn't even see some of the animatronics at all, and it definitely was a poor experience, but they made no effort to fix it even after a week.
So, attractions typically have a hierarchy of show effects. Certain show elements are considered more critical than others. iirc, if even one major element they considered major was reported down, the attraction would be forced to cycle out or in some cases, if a certain amount of lesser elements start to pile up and reach a certain value.
If the lightning was off in the scene, you should report it to a CM after you unload. If that show effect is on that CMs taught list of things to "compensate" you for your experience for, then they'll do something about it. However, in this instance, sending you through again doesn't fix the issue at hand because this wasn't a one-off glitchy audio track for that ride or a rude Guest in the same vehicle as you. In this case, the lighting will still be broken if they send you around again so they probably wouldn't offer that up as an option, they'd simply need to pass the information along, ASAP.
Once passed along, the team references whether or not the missing element is critical enough to warrant the attraction being cycled out/shut down and the issue repaired before reloading Guests. In this instance, my best guess would be that they were aware of the lightning issue but didn't consider it important enough with all things considered to justify shutting the attraction down for the day or for any kind of extended period of time. Whatever they needed to fix it has likely already been requested or been made aware of and facilities is playing a waiting game of sorts. While waiting, they need to determine if it's worth shutting the entire ride down so no one can ride it because of a few broken bulbs, etc. They likely determine on their morning and night ride throughs that it was "good enough" to justify keeping the ride open. Now, if the entire ride were coated in darkness, that'd probably be a different story.
Sadly, when certain things break to the point where they're "unfixable" without some sort of major investment from the company or pending approval/parts, that broken effect just sort of becomes the new standard and the documents that list their importance are just updated as such. I imagine this to be the case with things like Disco Yeti or the broken Chamber of Destiny. Because at that point, their choice is to either deny Guests the attraction entirely or run things in "B mode" until whatever bureaucracy that's holding things up get sorted out.
But you should still call things that are broken or bad experiences out, if you can and even if it doesn't lead to a free ride through because its for the betterment of everyone, too. On my last visit, Madame Leota had no face projection whatsoever so I mentioned it to a CM at the front gate afterwards and went to grab a bite at French Market. As we were dining, we saw the gates to the Mansion shut as they cycled Guests out of the attraction. When we came back later to find the Mansion had reopened, Leota was working just fine.
