But it is impartial in that you won't be removed for discussion in good faith, though you may be disagreed right to the bottom.

Spiteful trolling usually gets down-voted to hell as well (thankfully).

A little too often I see hyperbolic vitriol and shitposting persist, and though I don't mind the odd gag, it's not warranted. It clogs the thread as much as anything else.

That subreddit is impartial in itself. It's consensus of the participants, not censorship, if unpopular ideas aren't promoted whichever way they lean.

It reflects the mods.

How do vote tallies reflect the mods?

If they ban users, those users don't get to vote.

But they don't ban users for their opinions. They have clearly stated rules about civility in discussion — to my knowledge, those rules are the most common purpose for banning in that subreddit. That and spam.

edit: It would actually be kind of interesting to pull those kinds of statistics and display them — for various subreddits.

>you won't be removed for discussion in good faith,

>though you may be disagreed right to the bottom.

Is there a difference?

Both actions basically say "this speech is not worthy of consideration around here". The difference between making it still available to serve as a warning or removing it entirely is not meaningful IMO.

Downvoting says your opinion is unpopular. Banning means your opinion is unwelcome.

There is a difference. You are being obtuse.