After all, there are countervailing forces. Susan Faludi is countered by Christina Sommers. The National Resources Defense Council is countered by the American Council on Science and Health. Still, Gross and Levitt are legitimately concerned. The Left increasingly has the ear of the mainstream media and the mainstream foundations.
Science does require a supportive social and political order.
It can be inhibited or crushed by those in power, if they are sufficiently ideological and ruthless. Witness, for example, the destruction of genetics in the Soviet Union under Lysenkoism, as, well as the longtime refusal of the Soviets to accept linear programming r even relativity theory. Clearly, powerful forces are at work here, and their impact will be hard to reverse. Literature and the social sciences have already been seriously damaged. Nor are there many in the academy willing to attack feminist theories in areas where it is important to do so, e.g., personnel decisions and the creation of new programs.