Ethereum accounts don't own tokens in the same way they own ETH. Token balances exist with smart contracts, so when someone sends you booby coin all they are doing is updating the storage in a smart contract that 0x123 owns 1bil booby coin. Indexers like etherscan parse all transaction events and just keep a tally of what smart contracts have your address listed in balances.

By paying to get rid of it all you are doing is paying for etherscan to update its backend that your address is no longer listed in that smart contract. The real solution is to have wallet software that only tracks tokens you care about.