Without getting into arguments about desirableness of AA, I must still admit that I find this idea that Science was pure as driven snow until day before yesterday when AA started, quite quixotic boardering on hypocrisy. You opine that science only respected merit until recently. In terms of the first, Science, being a human enterprise, always suffered human follies. Something said by a Cambridge person or an aristrocrat always had a better chance of taken seriously compared to something said by a plebian or someone from a community college.
History is replete with people who got respected in the short term for reasons other than merit.
We continue to bestow short term respect on scientists based on such syntactic considerations as where they are from, who they know etc. etc. Short term respect based entirely on objective considerations of scientific merit is an idealization that we all know is far from true in the best of circumstances. If we want to worry, lets worry about this whole trend. Without backing evidence, I am forced to see it as your personal opinion and hearsay that you are trying to pass off as self-evident truth. They will always undervalue people as they damn well please.