It is certainly the biggest issue with the idea. I thought about having a checkbox in a reply. Also there could be a side pointing vote arrow. So if you place y

It is certainly the biggest issue with the idea. I thought about having a checkbox in a reply. Also there could be a side pointing vote arrow. So if you place your comment in generic category you would only have a side- and a down- vote buttons. If your comment gets more side-votes then up-votes it becomes generic (maybe after a threshold). Also people who's comments are too often made "generic" by community or moderators would not be trusted as much on "on-topic" comment votes. Without introducing more UI/UX it could then work like this: On-topic comments would go first, then side/generic comments and then down-voted comments. Side-vote would be a little like down-vote, but side-votes would count against other side-voted comments. As always it would go down to many checks and balances. So it it easier to say then do. Your manual intervention as you describe is often visible and welcome.