The danger area is conflating lack of success in a particular social setting with noncognitive skills.

I.e., "this person lacks persistence" versus "this person has given up because this social setting is pathological."

I worry that this trend is used to justify unethical behavior by making trait-based attributions of dissenters.

I say this without denying the importance of social skills--but there's a fine line between "socially skillful" and "psychopath", especially as you move up the ladder.