I think this depends on what "genuine" refers to in this sentence. Many issues have loud and/or shrill advocates on any or all sides, but that has nothing to do with the actual merits of any side. Anyone who is seriously interested in arriving at the best estimates of truth or utility available should disregard whether or not advocates are shrill and simply focus on facts.
Serious people are people willing to put their time and/or money into a cause. All power to these people but they are a fraction of the critical mass needed in any social campaign.
Genuine people are people who are sympathetic and have good intentions. They will do / not do what is helpful to the cause but it's not on of their top X priorities. Every movement needs lots and lots of these people. But these people will flee if a situation becomes toxic or they feel like they have more to lose than they can risk.
For example, few "genuine" men would ever write the article written by the OP, which essentially says, it's a pipeline problem. Why? Because even if they could prove with hard data that the biggest factor is the lack of female applicants they would still get torched by the ideologues. So the safe choice is not to engage, give a little extra consideration to the few female applicants received, and move on with your day.