[rjaco31]

> downvoting into oblivion articulate comments not at all devoid of content really has become endemic here, and many (though certainly not all) of those I read anyway were obviously downvoted for disagreement, often political

Maybe I'm biased, but I personally had the opposite feeling, the majority of the comments I see grayed out are usually somehow aggressive/salty rants that don't really try to bring anything useful to the thread, and the few other ones are comments with technical details that are plain wrong.

[newuser88273]

I probably unconsciously undercount "legitimate" grey-outs, so... maybe. Still, you really can't have all three of these: (1) Votes to register (dis-)agreement and (2) very prominent visual effect of downvotes, yet (3) no hivemind induction.

I'm not lobbying for changes. The whole up/downvote business is really hard, maybe there's no better way. Just thought people here might be interested in the fact that HN has been getting somewhat of a hivemind reputation, lately.