There's a book called "The trouble with Physics" written by Lee Smolin in 2006, who is a theoretical physicist himself and wrote a survey on string theory back then, involved in the string theory community and documented his observations in that book.

In short the book conclude many of them are experiencing "group-think" and over-emphasize the importance of string theory given what they can't prove theoretically as well as experimentally.

> Many are approachable and responsive.

You must be talking about some other people here. In my experience we're not. We really don't have time to address to some random people from the public on why we disagree with what they believe.