I think the fear from hitting the fairway wood stems from amateurs using too little loft to hit the ball in the air. Too often I meet students that think they must hit a 3 wood because it will go further. This is simply not the case as it is a product of launch conditions. I use the example frequently of a jumbo jet and a small plane. The jumbo jet takes lots of speed to get off the ground where the small plane takes significantly less speed. This is the same with fairway woods. The lower the loft, the more ball speed needed to lift it into the air. This includes how much energy I am to transfer from the club to the golf ball.
The second part is that you need to scrape the grass when hitting a fairway wood. Many students feel the need to pick the ball off the ground with this club which is simply not the case.