Nah… if you are not lucky enough to be in a discussion early it’s just one side of the hivemind jerking it and the other side stfu because no one wants to get downvote abused :)
Typically, when people get downvoted, the downvotes are for the tone of the comment - ad hominem attacks, extremist conspiracy theories with lack of supporting data, unwilling to see different perspectives. But the downvoted then blame this mystical "hivemind" as the cause of their downvotes, rather than try to improve their style of engagement.
Tbf, I agree with you that a lot downvote whining is a lazy attempt to save a bad argument, but regarding this:
> Typically, when people get downvoted, the downvotes are for the tone of the comment - ad hominem attacks
Downvote and their purpose has come up a few times and generally the seems to be a consensus seems to be that downvote=disagree is 100%, legitimate, citing some quote by PG. And if you go to certain a threads (highly political ones), it's not uncommon to see some of the more reasonable comments greyed out if they even remotely challenge the zeitgeist of the current thread inhabitants.
This also works the other way around. You can be a complete dick and violate half the guidelines and end up highly upvoted if enough people agree with you. I know because it's happened to me.