You and your brother get a lot of comments, you two also try to respond to all of them or the vast majority of them. It takes time. I got a lot of comments on one of Galen's post not long ago, it took me what felt like forever to respond o them all, and then I had other comments to respond to. So it takes a lot of time, and I remember back on steem when I was part of an onboard and help new users team, it took a lot of time, and still like you said some just did not get it or were unwilling to get it, or were just pretending so they could get support.
I waste a lot of time doing meaningless things, but when it is a waste of time trying to help it really wears down on the nerves, the body and the spirit, and can as you showed in your 18 year old story use up a precious resource that could be used by someone else that would honestly value it.
Yeah, it is time consuming, but also rewarding in many ways. How else are you meant to get to know people here? Those here just for the rewards though, they don't care about the people behind the votes, as long as they get some money.
It is the spirit that kills me the most. People who could have had better and even helped others, but instead - they "did what they wanted" and will take that to the grave. Hopefully that feels good for them.