>a forum that is based on letting downvotes directly silence an opinion I cannot express just how strongly opposed to that approach I am. I reserve my use of t

>a forum that is based on letting downvotes directly silence an opinion I cannot express just how strongly opposed to that approach I am. I reserve my use of the downvote to low effort comments, factually inaccuracies, and the like. If we silence people we disagree with we end up with propaganda, not discussion. I’m often hesitant to downvote any comments that espouse a political opinion I disagree with, even if they are eg low effort, because I’m worried about silencing the opposition. Surprisingly (to me), I don’t see anything about what you should or shouldn’t downvote in the site guidelines, so it’s possible my views don’t align with the hn community as a whole. But I really like being able to have constructive discussion, and would hate to have hn’s quality degrade to that of a political subreddit.