Fortran is great for computational programmers (ie. scientists) who can code things up without worrying about certain details that you need to keep straight in

Fortran is great for computational programmers (ie. scientists) who can code things up without worrying about certain details that you need to keep straight in other languages. A lot of the things you're talking about are for general programming for which Fortran is not well suited. May be your initial interest in programming comes from games essentially which is why Basic appealed to you. For a fortran programmer, the initial interest comes from "what tool does my advisor use to calculate light propagation in semi-ionized media" and for that Fortran excells. When evaluating what is good for beginners it helps to remember not all beginners approach programming from the same place. Traditionally computational scientists were a distinct and equal in size subset of the users of computer resources in academic and industry research centers accross the nation, specifically distinct from computer scientists. Today they are smaller total fraction but that history continues to inform how they approach computation and mentor new scientists learning to use computers for science, which diverges from the way computer scientists do both in approach and requisite mental model.