As it seems that non-hackers and just general idiots become more common on HN, it would be nice if pg & friends thought about some counter-measures.

I understand the general idiots point, but why non-hackers? I remember that a lot of time I read very valuable comments from doctors, or lawyers, or mathematicians. Some of the articles that go to the front page are not related to hacking and this has always been fine.

hm, non-hackers was bad wording on my part. I guess my view of hackers is very broad, describing a mindset, not particular skillsets.

That's what the downvote is for

Actually, in the case of such an egregiously stupid comment, that's what the flag button is for.

While I agree fabulous's comment is totally inappropriate Im caught off guard by some comments to my submissions and or commments left.

For instance I recently unsubscribed to Groupon emails. After doing so Groupon pointed me to a page to watch a tongue and cheek video to get me to change my mind.

I hate getting spam emails and I was very eager to banish any further Groupons (signed up by mistake). There tongue and cheek video was very ineffective for me. I did think it was unique, interesting and something worth sharing. But, since I felt negatively towards it the title of my submission was "Worst Email Unsubscibe Page?". Because that is how I felt about it but still wondered what others thought.

For whatever reason because I chose a negative title the submission was flamed - http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2928041

Again that is how I felt time of writing the title because it was un-effective for me, but wondered what others thought about it.

Ive been reading HN since May '07 (various accounts) so Im not a noob. Maybe Im someone who thinks differently at times then others here?

Iirc, the first title was "Worst Email Unsubscribe Page" without question mark. Also, the post was basically an editorial comment. I think it would have been flamed less if you had taken the time to write a short blog post about it and then submitted that.

I am someone who is actively resistant to "group-think". It often gets me in hot water to be so out of step. It's tricky to be very out of step with a group and still participate in a meaningful, constructive fashion. I try extremely hard to avoid framing things in a blatantly negative fashion. Negative framing of that sort seems to only work if the majority are pretty much guaranteed to heartily agree.

Not really. Downvote is for poor responses, which are still more or less acceptable. We don't want to spend our time on HN downvoting trolling clowns and other vermin.