Although I think it’s unfortunate this comment is so downvoted, I’m not surprised to be honest. As a rhetorical matter more generally, I would recommend two major things:
“Narrow the sale” (and soften the language): perhaps the post and this comment aren’t extremely expansive, but I do think they try challenging too many orthodox beliefs at once and/or otherwise have unnecessary baggage. For example, see the title itself which, like I argued, seems to beg the question. See also the language in the quote: “This struck me as a catastrophic move, turning a vaccine developed by a nonprofit institution into a way to make a company lots of money, with no clear upside.” Instead, you should be very clear up front what 2-3 main claims you are arguing for up front; in this case, I think the main points are things like “we ought to develop an alternative market mechanism for incentivizing R&D and distribution of vaccines”.
Engage more deeply in market-mechanism reasoning or within “market” frameworks, including by agreeing where you need to agree / indicating more clearly that, for example, you understand that patents are better than nothing. For example, if I were in your position I would probably have lead with something like “I am generally in favor of typical market solutions, but in the case of IP regulations and the market for vaccine R&D/production there are specific points of market failure that patents inefficiently address: X, Y, Z. This is why I think one of two alternatives would be better: A1; A2. Because...” This helps to make your propositions clearer and more familiar to the primary audience you are trying to persuade: people who would support patents because of market dynamics. This really also ties into my previous point, about avoiding charged language and a wide array of potential weak spots.
Although I think it’s unfortunate this comment is so downvoted, I’m not surprised to be honest. As a rhetorical matter more generally, I would recommend two major things:
“Narrow the sale” (and soften the language): perhaps the post and this comment aren’t extremely expansive, but I do think they try challenging too many orthodox beliefs at once and/or otherwise have unnecessary baggage. For example, see the title itself which, like I argued, seems to beg the question. See also the language in the quote: “This struck me as a catastrophic move, turning a vaccine developed by a nonprofit institution into a way to make a company lots of money, with no clear upside.” Instead, you should be very clear up front what 2-3 main claims you are arguing for up front; in this case, I think the main points are things like “we ought to develop an alternative market mechanism for incentivizing R&D and distribution of vaccines”.
Engage more deeply in market-mechanism reasoning or within “market” frameworks, including by agreeing where you need to agree / indicating more clearly that, for example, you understand that patents are better than nothing. For example, if I were in your position I would probably have lead with something like “I am generally in favor of typical market solutions, but in the case of IP regulations and the market for vaccine R&D/production there are specific points of market failure that patents inefficiently address: X, Y, Z. This is why I think one of two alternatives would be better: A1; A2. Because...” This helps to make your propositions clearer and more familiar to the primary audience you are trying to persuade: people who would support patents because of market dynamics. This really also ties into my previous point, about avoiding charged language and a wide array of potential weak spots.