Miners who get suicide ganked do also interact...
What I am opposing against is the (sadly) common sentiment that the miner chewing rocks is somehow less worth/important than the suicide ganker. If somebody wants to pay for a subscription and spend his time mining, then by all means let him do that. And there is no reason why his field of gameplay should be neglected for any other, especially not when there is many miners like him around.
This is what I like about the new stance of CCP; they appear to want to evaluate features on how much value they have for all players and not just the subsection the feature is aimed at. Of course, not all players carry the same weight, but at least they are being taken into consideration.
Btw. here is a story: I once mined ore deep within the Amarr FW zone. I turned all that ore into a wide range of frigates, destroyers, weaponry and ammunition in an location that otherwise was devoid of stock and sold plentiful. A one point I stopped because... mining is boring. I might not have chatted or socialized with many (if any) during my time there, but one could speculate on the impact of my actions. Maybe the Amarr militia would have been doing better if mining was not so boring.