I don't think you're right. The reasons seem to be that people are downmodding as a social normalization function. It's like saying "don't post more like that please".
I think you are taking downmods a bit too personally.
Well, different people are having different takes on the semantics I guess. How about a quota though? Nobody likes an overly negative person at a party. IRL, we can't enforce good behavior that way, but here we can through the power of software.