I think you’re right to an extent, but I can no longer say something like this is unrealistic in light of the videos we saw last year alone. The creepy Obama pledges, the rants about racist Christians, etc.
Professors are emboldened in our culture to say and do what they like, whether its praising mass murderers like Joseph Stalin (and there is a video in which a professor tells his students that nobody died under the Soviet Union), or declaring God dead.
But you’re right it is often more subtle. Political correctness is of course the greatest tool. Current college reading and writing courses are now 90% focused on greivance industry authors like Richard Wright and Langston Hughes, both of whom were communists. There’s also the Feminazi and Gaystapo lobbies getting their sick literature into colleges.
Even down to the books on academic writing like ‘A Writer’s Reference - 7th Edition’ has in it the command never to use the word ‘mankind’ because it “excludes women”.
I think we’re a few years off, but not there yet. So it gives the other side the ability to sneer that we are attacking straw men. Only they are allowed that luxury.