It's reasonable for people to find that sleazy and dishonest, it just seems somewhat...academic...to me.

Because what else can be done except to say "ok, there are symptoms, now the symptoms went away, huh." If he was honest, it doesn't reflect that badly on the professionals because there's always going to be cases that fit the pattern.

His distortion seems exactly like every pop-sci article today that is written for outrage-clicks. It seems kind of quaint, even though granted it's an influential paper.