[Buge]

It's a common strategy. It has nothing specifically to do with China. I don't think I've ever seen HN posts saying think of the children.

Here's a popular post about a guy doing it, I'm not sure where I first found this post, it might have been HN. Either way I'm pretty sure I've seen some of his stuff linked on HN. http://ascii.textfiles.com/archives/1011 He wrote several followup posts with metrics and stuff.

For example 3 people here say they use it as a strategy, and nothing about China: http://ask.metafilter.com/4302/Is-there-any-etiquette-to-hot...

This accepted answer with 17 upvotes recommends it: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/3990337/how-to-protect-ag...

Also see http://i.imgur.com/WDDH8wj.jpg http://krisalis.org/weblog/?p=1137