I find d/voting when it becomes a 'power' thing, to be ugly.
I agree, this is also why I'm not a fan of posts being zero'd, in usual circumstances I would attempt to intervene but it's hard to make that decision when the content of these posts is something I wouldn't want rewarded personally.
...polarities, positions and p(L)andemics aside, I've been chuckling at what you expressed above :).
I acknowledge what I see of you as an overall benefactor to Hive and respect that you take the time to engage and discuss. I used to have you on autovote until I read a post of yours saying you didn't like it.
I did not have you in mind when commenting about d/voting power-flexinig but I did wonder if you were sympathetic or even affiliated with the d/voting sprees on, for example, Jasonliberty's posts.
From what you say it seems perhaps that you do not engage in these d/voting sprees (on pLandemic materials) and might even be inclined to address some of it if it weren't for the fact that you did not wish it rewarded anyway.
If so, I'd be pleased to hear that you are not part of bigHiveBullyPower that jumps on those that question the p(L)andemic. I find that bit ugly! I acknowledge that you yourself have a different position on the matter of masks etc and it was actually pretty cool to read how your and Urasoul's discussion progressed.
In general I think this genre is taking more from the rewardpool than it should compared to everything else on the internet in reflection to Hive, in the same wave I also think a lot of content about hive gets too much rewards as well but I don't see it being as potentially dangerous as causing people to infect others, etc. My personal opinion is that the plandemic discussions all over the internet are blown out of proportion, they either operate a lot of fake activity that takes in others along the way, a lot of fake/stolen content, (this person came up with this so let's respin this content so I also talk about this while leaving out facts and hyping up the content more). It feels like a lot of the unemployed people that were supporting trump, couldn't continue with that and had to find something else to do or get hired for protests, etc, are now on this bandwagon. Doesn't mean I disagree with all discussions, but if you see what other content this is causing - people running around shaming others for wearing masks, being obnoxious, vulgar and violent towards them, it's not something I like to see and I think a lot of that stems from these influencers who are monetizing something many themselves don't understand as long as it gets them clicks and growth.
I'm not one to jump onto downvoting cause others are, I also don't agree with zero'ing out posts, Hive is worth a considerable amount more than it was a few months ago so downvoting it to an extent where the autovoters can choose if they want to continue some times blindly supporting certain authors or content with their autovotes should be enough.
The few times I do get personal, hasn't happened recently, I use some downvotes on people I think are simply wrong, offensive or just cancer to the platform. If you notice I didn't go and downvote that dumbass that told me to suck his balls cause it's not worth it even if I could - actions cause reactions everywhere and Hive isn't immutable to that, it's even more prone to people reacting in different ways here with a lot more power and influence available than on other places on the internet.
I'm all for people posting their ideas, whatever they may be on an immutable chain, followers being able to view it, engage with it and reward such content in ways that can't be countered. Them feeling the entitlement that what they think should be rewarded should not be countered by anyone, going on to saying it's censorship and stuff like that is just stupid and makes me think it's just about the money and 99% of the time it is.
You see, my POV is that material from folk like Urasoul and Jasonliberty represent well-researched articles on serious issues. They seem open to 'fact-checking' in its original sense of verification and validation of reported data/info. There are shit-stirrers of course but some of the folk being systematically d/voted on Hive are reporting stuff they have researched and processed, and are writing (in part at least) so that the awareness of what is going on is made available to others.
I believe you to be a sincere person with a sense of personal integrity - an impression formed from reading your stuff/observing your engagement over time. I understand that your position on the p(L)andemic may approximate somewhat to the one below (quoting myself):
Humanity faces an existential threat like never before! We must all adhere to officially proclaimed, expert-led guidelines in order to survive. Those that do not, or refuse to comply, potentially threaten everyone's survival by their non-compliance. Information which challenges or purports to dispute official claims/the 'accepted' view is mis/dis-information. This information is dangerous, in part at least because folk could be lulled into a false sense of security and underestimate the danger posed by the existential threat. The Science is pretty much settled on this and in any case, we are in a Global Emergency requiring unprecedented action, even if that means curtailing what were once held up as unassailable Human Rights. We need to pull through this together and this will only really happen if we all act in the unison of conformity to officially agreed and advised action. Any notion of a 'conspiracy' behind the global pandemic is as outrageous as it is ridiculous!
I tend to the other side of the above- detailed in the link above coz I don't wanna copy-pasta too much, but if you read it you'll see.
PS. Thanks for removing your autovotes. There's been times I've wanted to just "shitpost" but knowing it'll end up on trending or the hot list has held me back. I've found ways to balance it now by forfeiting post rewards either to projects I think need a bit more funding or directly back to the DAO, or giving back to curators through @reward.app. There's many ways to do so, especially when you have big autovotes, the sad part is that very few do.
:D
...but that's also why I rate you, coz I've seen you do that kinda stuff consistently and not d/v folk who yell at Whales!