The issue is the NRs are loud, where as LW's pro-enlightenment majority is not so loud about being pro-enlightenment. I mean, when Eliezer said what you just said in your first paragraph, Michael Anissimov whined about how deeply shocked he was that Eliezer would be distancing himself from the NRs. He could only act shocked because Eliezer's statement was so unusual. Mostly people sort of ignore them, or watch them in vague amusement (something I've done a lot of on Twitter, I confess), with Yvain putting a lot of energy into discussing them in very respectful terms.

My theory is they get a relatively respectful hearing because they're meta-contrarian rather than uneducated, but as Yvain says in that post you can't tell the truth of a position by where it lies in the signaling game. Meta-contrarian crackpots are still crackpots, and LessWrong should be striving not to be associated with crackpottery even when it comes in a cute meta-contrarian wrapper. On the other hand, it should especially avoid that when people report being turned off from LessWrong by a specific form of crackpottery.