>I assume this gets to the heart of why anyone would 'downvote' me here for asking for simple information, there's a strict anti-intellectual force on HN that h

>I assume this gets to the heart of why anyone would 'downvote' me here for asking for simple information, there's a strict anti-intellectual force on HN that has a problem with anyone digging in to what "austerity" actually means. Yes, I found your downvotes disappointing too! Chin up, the votes often seem to get better over time, as remedial voting is done - i.e. voting up of greyed-out things when you wouldn't bother usually etc. Who cares anyway. You're asking uncommon questions on here perhaps, and surprised they're downvoted? Complaining about voting gets you more downvotes, rightly so. The only reason I can think of is that you wrote 'stupidly', and read very quickly your comment looks like a complaint about the article. Maybe if you'd put more of this detail in the initial comment. p.s. Be very careful of nursing political conspiracy theories on here. ("there's a strict anti-intellectual force on HN that ..") People are convinced HN is right wing, left wing, and everything in between, and are totally certain of that. The political topics do tend to be more..careless and loose on here, perhaps unsurprisingly.