Couple of comments. As Kevin mentions soaring is cheap. 1-26s and HPs can be found for less than 5K these days. You can spend more on a moped. As for landouts, I get the PIA part, and I get the don't want to risk damage part as well. Was recently re-reading Kai Gertsen's excellent Off Airport Landings book and in the intro the author says at the time of writing he had 169 off airport landings. I don't think anyone is landing out that much anymore, something changed. Cost of gliders can't be all of it, 169 bad field landings would put a dent in anyone's wallet.
For the original question if culture comes from the universities we are in trouble. Penn state recently banned its Outing club from going outing they “made the determination that the hiking, canoeing, kayaking, trail building and camping activities the student-led club has long engaged in are too risky,”.
Spelunking club and Scuba club also stopped. Government is full of the same types as university administrators. People that believe hiking is too dangerous for college students, imagine if they knew we let 14 years solo?