[microcolonel]

> Of course, then you have to police yourself by not saying unpopular things just to be difficult, but only if you genuinely think they need to be said and are adding something to the discussion and the site.

It seems like you're impugning their motives here.

Do you honestly think that most people whose thoughtful comments are downvoted are engaging in bad faith, “saying unpopular things just to be difficult”?

[pdonis]

> Do you honestly think that most people whose thoughtful comments are downvoted are engaging in bad faith, “saying unpopular things just to be difficult”?

No. Remember that I was talking about a particular subset of users: the ones who have enough karma that they don't care if they get downvoted. In order to get that much karma, such a user will have already made a lot of thoughtful comments that were made in good faith. I was just observing that, once a user has enough karma not to care if they get downvoted, the feedback mechanism that regulated their behavior up to that point--karma--no longer has much impact. When put in that kind of position, it has been known to happen that a person might change their behavior. But I would hope and expect that a change for the worse under those circumstances would be rare.

[microcolonel]

I guess I just disagree that the behaviour required to gain a karma cushion is "good", or "better" than the behaviour that stagnates or moderately shrinks karma.

I personally think that playing in to the echo chamber is a subtler form of abuse; making the people in the community progressively more unhealthy by carefully avoiding anything that looks or feels challenging.

I don't think a healthy community is one which encourages people to fat eachother up on sweet nothings and uncontroversial shower thoughts.

It seems to me that the most popular replies are often the ones which present an obvious, widely-held opinion as though it's controversial outside the group; which enables holders of the majority opinion to think of themselves as underdogs and free thinkers.

I think a lot of harm is done by rewarding people for defending the majority opinion as though it's controversial.

[pdonis]

> I guess I just disagree that the behaviour required to gain a karma cushion is "good", or "better" than the behaviour that stagnates or moderately shrinks karma.

It seems like you think that upvotes are not being used to identify posts that add value, but simply as a signal of agreement with groupthink. Am I reading that right?

Also, do you think that downvotes are similarly misused? (I.e., to slap down controversial but value-add posts?)

My own experience is that the posts of mine that have gotten lots of upvotes have been thoughtful ones, not simple "party line" ones, and the posts of mine that have gotten downvotes have been thoughtful ones as well--just thoughtful ones that the majority disagreed with but didn't have any good refutations of. But my experience might not be typical. It is certainly more plausible on its face that both upvotes and downvotes would be misused, than that downvotes would be misused but upvotes would not.

[microcolonel]

> It seems like you think that upvotes are not being used to identify posts that add value, but simply as a signal of agreement with groupthink. Am I reading that right?

Put simply, no.

[pdonis]

Then I'm afraid I don't understand what point you're trying to make.

[microcolonel]

I didn't say anything about upvotes or groupthink, I know that's for sure. If you would like to understand what I've said better, your first step should be to read it for the first time.

There is nothing wrong with upvoting something you agree with, that makes a lot of sense. What I take issue with is downvoting something sincere because you disagree with it, but without supporting an alternative position. If the only signal is "this comment deserves to be gray because people disagree with it in their own personal ways", then nothing is learned.

[kevin_thibedeau]

I made a generic, non-specific comment about people using religion to manipulate and swindle a few weeks ago. As expected it got -4 because it had too many trigger words for the snowflakes. Then it was flagged into oblivion. I don't mind harsh downvote even when unmerited. What shouldn't be allowed is groupthink as an excuse for completely erasing non-incendiary discourse.