IMHO, I'm sure you may have perfectly valid reasons for not going to folk clubs. That is not the issue. It is your sweeping -

Folk Clubs are fast becoming a waste of time, partly as Jim Carroll says, because its possible to spend a night at one and not hear a single folk song and partly because of the people there who will insist to you that what you just heard was indeed folk music.

...that I am challenging. You say yourself that "Of course some of them featured actual folk" so you know that it's perfectly possible to spend a night at one and hear plenty of folk music. That is certainly my experience. Go to the ones that give you what you want and leave the others to those who want something else.