My understanding is that they don't split your subscription fee up to the people you listen to. They base it on who all of their subscribers are listening to. So even if you listened to your favorite obscure artists 24/7, they might not get a dime if nobody else is listening. However, a sizeable chunk of your subscription will go to whoever is most popular on the platform even if you didn't listen to them at all.

No it wouldn't. Imagine a hyper-small version of Spotify with two artists and two subscribers. The fee is 10$ per user, distributed fully to the artists (to make the math easy).

User A only listens to artist A, user B only listens to artist B. BUT: user A listens to artist A 30 times a month, while user b only listens to artist B 10 times a month. Artist A gets paid 15 of the 20 total dollars - user B is paying for some of artist A's fee, even though they've never listened to them.

My Spotify subscription is paying for the artists most put on large playlists, the ones most played by fitness centers and cafes, and for botfarms. I want it to pay the artists I listen to.