If you can create a feedback loop, people will use that loop to use that loop to get positive feedback. Unless you eliminate comments entirely, people will keep doing this. And if you remove the counts from your platform, you're just opening yourself up to have a secondary service provider create those metrics and sell them to influencers instead of being able to monetize them yourself.
Again, there's no advantage for a social network to kill its ability to create a community and content on its own. It goes against the model. You want to make this a bigger discussion about corporate responsibility and whatnot, that's a worthwhile conversation. But saying "keep the social platforms, but kill the social part unmeasurable" is a weird place to take it to.
I mean if you kill the comments (ignoring "likes and views"), nobody would post anything on Hackernews. Engagement and community building are how message boards and social networks function...