i think the online atheist pipeline that developed in the 2000s as a response to bush-era evangelicals did damage to "sciencey" attitudes in some leftists' eyes. in the bush years a lot of "i fucking love science" people became invested in being "skeptics", which then to being online atheists then some went on to become fash-adjacent or idw types.

many young people at that time were super eager to dunk on creationists or wacky born-again christians. the lack of public leftist discussion and spaces at that time led those people down a more positivist path which over time became a right wing recruitment path.

there are probably people here who can tell that history much better than i can. but i think as more online leftist spaces have blossomed in the past few years there has been a real aversion to an alignment with science, as for many leftists it is still associated with the obnoxious positivist type that emerged from those bush years.