I’ve noticed on occasion that comments that border on political speech can really go either way, even if they argue the same point in the same way. HN is, at least according to dang, an unusually diverse community, so leaving it up to a dice roll and timing for a comment to survive its first 10 minutes seems not great.

I often see completely factual comments get downvoted once (to 0), and since it then gets a little greyed out, people turn off their brain and blindly ram the downvote button on it. It just leads to bandwagoning.

I find the opposite. Fairly often one of my comments will get a quick downvote or two, but they quickly then get enough upvotes to get back into the black, I expect as reasonable people, who might not have bothered upvoting the comment otherwise, do so because they can see that it didn't deserve downvotes.

downvotes on HN are, by official policy, for disagreeing with ideas. They are not just for low quality posts. And, even on sites where downvotes are supposed to be for low quality/off topic, etc enough people still use them as "I don't like this idea and don't want you to spread it even if it's arguably valid".

Further, they're a form of violence against the poster. Not sure what other word to use to be told in a single click "You Suck!". It is or arguably can be a form of bullying.

They are not a form of violence. That's concept creep in order to force home a rhetorical point that you're trying to make.

> downvotes on HN are, by official policy, for disagreeing with ideas

Care to link to that policy? I was always of the impression that short low-quality comments that don’t further the discussion are prime examples of acceptable downvote targets here. Disagreeing with a constructively expressed idea is best done by expressing your own argument in a reply.

A quick google

https://www.google.com/search?q=disgreement+downvote+hacker+...

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16131314

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17996858

> I was always of the impression that short low-quality comments that don’t further the discussion are prime examples of acceptable downvote targets here. Disagreeing with a constructively expressed idea is best done by expressing your own argument in a reply.

Amen to that. Not how it always works around here though.

They are not, the guidelines are linked in the footer and don't mention anything about downvotes aside from "not talking about downvotes".

I personally upvote posts I disagree with that nonetheless improve my thoughts and productively challenge my assumptions. I prefer a voting convention that increases the probability that I give my attention to worthwhile content rather than trendy sentiment.

[clarification: I suspect you agree and do not mean to imply otherwise, though I do not know]

> Further, they're a form of violence against the poster. Not sure what other word to use to be told in a single click "You Suck!". It is or arguably can be a form of bullying.

Your point before that part was something I could engage with, but if you really see any form of disagreement as "violence" or a "form of bullying" then I don't understand how you can even function online.

"Further, they're a form of violence against the poster."

You suck.