> And yet, you’re making this point on a platform that has down-votes. Yes. And if I was a HN developer, which I am not, I would immediately remove that functi

> And yet, you’re making this point on a platform that has down-votes. Yes. And if I was a HN developer, which I am not, I would immediately remove that functionality - but even then, my argument doesn't really apply here, because HN isn't really meant to be a constructive platform to begin with. > I don’t think it’s 100% clear-cut that you should never ever implement downvotes. For constructive platforms: absolutely, 100%. It's well understood what kind of behaviour is driven by the availability of a semi-anonymous "disagree" button. There's not really any gray area here. > Other comments might be wildly off-topic or deeply non-constructive, and those I down-vote. But to each their own. On a constructive platform, that is a matter for moderation, not opinion. The problem of downvotes is that it combines the two, even though they are fundamentally different concepts.