< caring about opinions being actually good vs being seen to be good >

 Well, there’s your answer right there, isn’t it?

Scott may be the Rightful Caliph (or a contender for the position) within Rationalism and its Adjacency, but outside of our sphere, he has all sorts of markers that are low-status, or are tribal low-status, and he poses a danger to a lot of people that are farming status through toxic takes.

I mean, imagine if Rationalism became the new normal.  Sure, this would probably crash a lot of metaphorical trains and the results would be observable in the global GDP, but one of the trains that got crashed would be most of the established Commentariat, their pundits, the outrage-farming, clickbaiting and so on.

New ones would likely develop in the aftermath, because Rationalism doesn’t actually remove all sorts of base human emotions.  However, the new ones would be different people.  

Scott’s social status is zero sum with these people.  His gain is their loss.  They’re going to attack, attack, attack.  They may not even fully know why they’re doing it.