It's not actually worse. Including UT, the Big 12 has three AAU universities. With UT, five out of 16 (31.25%) SEC universities will be AAU members. Excluding UT, the average Big 12 USNWR ranking is 150. Excluding UT (but including OU), the average SEC ranking in the USNWR would be 113.
Anyway, I don't care at all. All of these schools (except maybe Vandy -- not sure), including UT, accept student-athletes with NCAA minimum scores and manage to keep them eligible with a combination of joke classes and intensive academic support programs. I was resigned to the idea that the snobbery of the UT academic side would preclude us from ever joining the SEC and would eventually land us either in the most boring division in all of the P5 (Big Ten West) or in a conference where no one cares (Pac-12). Thank God Hartzell, Eltife, and Del Conte were all here at the right time instead of Dodds/Patterson and Powers/Fenves.
The only thing a conference matters for to me is sports. No school rises or falls in academic reputation based on where its athletics programs play their games.