> Why did you vouch for it before actually reading it?
I felt I'd read enough of the piece to trust the author's intentions. I liked her "consilience" example, and liked the overview she gave of where she was going. I've finished reading it now, and continue to feel confident that it is a solid piece worthy of discussion.
> Discussion isn't inherently virtuous.
I may disagree with this, but it depends on how literally we interpret "inherently". I certainly agree that not all discussions are productive, and some can cause more harm than good. But I also believe that understanding is between parties who disagree is practically impossible without discussion. I think the inherent virtue of discussion is that when it stops things often get worse.
I'm fairly strongly on the "mistake theory" side of conflict. I think that most people share common meta-goals, but have different strategies for how to get there. I think with more information sharing, conflict can be avoided. The alternative is "conflict theory", where the goals themselves are simply incompatible. I'm hoping this is not the case in the US, as I think that leads to literal civil war.
> Things are mostly flagged for a reason.
I agree. I think "Some small subset of flagged stories are worthy of discussion" is compatible with "Most flagged stories deserve to be flagged".
I commonly flag about 5-10 new stories a day, mostly outright spam. I probably vouch for about 1-2 stories per day that I feel have been wrongly (or unnecessarily) flagged. Of these, some drop off quietly for lack of attention, some are reflagged and disappear, some turn into flamewars, and some generate interesting discussion. I'm sure this story is not "spam", and I'm doing my best to put/keep this one in the category of "interesting discussion". I think this one is (barely) in the last category, and there are some scattered small productive discussions going on.
I feel like most people think this story is making a claim that it is not. As I see it, the main claim is that adverse reactions to the vaccine are likely to be underreported. I think this is true. The author believes that as a healthy young woman, the risk of the vaccine to her is greater than the benefit. I'm not sure if she's right here, but I do believe there certainly could be a cutoff age where this could be true.
Some people think that publicly acknowledging this possibility needs to be avoided, because it lends credence to "anti-vaxxers". Possibly true, but I think they are already set in their ways. I'm more concerned that the government bodies (and "Science" as a whole) may be unnecessarily burning their credibility for future events by trying to bend the truth to better fit their desired outcome of having everyone take the vaccine. I think they are well intentioned, but don't think the "noble lie" is a good long term strategy. I'd hoped for more discussion on that level, but at least there is some.