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Notes -
Ever since Aristoteles there are broadly three categories of rhetoric/arguments: logos, pathos and ethos.
I'd say that at least during the last decade the discourse shifted more toward pathos/ethos side of things and this distinction does not even have to be gendered. At the base you have encounters which you described: you make me feel discomfort therefore you are a bad person doing bad things. There is whole slew of rhetorical arguments that are basically ad hominem seeped in pathos/ethos, to use some classic examples they are for sure things like who hurt you that you say this or only fascists think that and so forth.
You can even see it even in language change. For instance if in the past if there was something problematic it meant something practical - it is problematic to tighten a screw without screwdriver or in general accomplish some task without some necessary preconditions, that was what was at the core of the problem. Nowadays problematic may mean that process of tightening a screw is perpetuating some social injustice. In fact to problematize is now a verb that even has positive valence and denotes exactly this: look at something and find some way this may harm somebody or a way it transgresses some principles. It is a moral duty to do this and then relentlessly criticize that thing until it is changed only to then target it with even more rigor until that new thing changes in a cycle with hope that at the end of the process of this negative thinking something good crystalizes.
I have to add that your conclusion of evading this stuff is absolutely reasonable one but with one caveat. Even if you do not care about politics, politics may suddenly care for you. It is worthwhile to get in contact with this stuff from time to time so you are not caught with your pants down so to speak. You can train your resolve to adopt fuck you I won't do what you tell me stance when needed, not getting yourself emotionally or morally extorted by such a rhetoric.
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