> I can't find any encouragement for downvoting things you simply disagree with Paul Graham declared it "OK" 10 years ago (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id

> I can't find any encouragement for downvoting things you simply disagree with Paul Graham declared it "OK" 10 years ago (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=117171 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=117171) and despite realising that it caused problems 2 years later, the problem's never really been fixed. > Interesting to see how far two subjective perceptions of the same thing I think this is directly related to the problem. Bob posts a comment that is not offensive, but 'goes against the grain' for a large part of HN readers, so his comment is downvoted quickly to the point that it doesn't even appear for most people (either literally because they have `showdead` turned off or figuratively because it's greyed out to be almost unreadable, and at the bottom of sometimes long comment threads). John reads the comment thread and never sees Bob's comment. John doesn't see the problem because the problem is things not being seen.