Because there may be more emotion involved doesn't negate its intellectual value - that's a scapegoat reason, and people avoiding intellectual interests that have emotion involved is avoiding learning and opportunities to learn. That's arguably quite detrimental to society, and "hackers" avoiding it who have domain expertise with technology and maybe could provide a unique perspective or brainstorm uniquely is then likely reduced. Arguably political issues, policy and information propagation are the main problems we have in society these days.