"Folk, alas, is a very different sort of word"
simple folk - fisher folk - farming folk..... you name it, it's used by all sorts of people to describe their own communities.
You and your 'baby-out-with-the-bathwater' mob are the ones who have applied connotations to the term in order to tear down what others have put up.
You are knocking down long out-of-date straw men of your own construction. Nobody is defending the mistakes of the pioneers who got a great deal wrong - you are attempting to deny the existence of a distinctive and identifiable body of song which has been acknowledged by every community we have ever worked in and - as usual - you are offering nothing to replace it.
The people you have made your persitant target have never claimed to have had "feck all with the creation of the music in the first place" - that is yet another target of your own making.
Whatever name you decide on - I'd stick with the 'bland' bit - it suits perfectly what you have to offer.
Jim Carroll