I have been curious about how other people parse their way through HN. I think new accounts can't even downvote. It is common to see people ask about the downvotes even though the second last rule on the guideline [0] says not to question it.
I try to not downvote to disagree. I downvote misinformation, statements that are egressive towards a person and not the point they are making, responses that say "This.".
[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
For example, a few from the ruby post that was on the front page recently:
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23990533
I was led to believe that the opposite was true:
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16131314
This was brought to my attention by the mods (dang) and they agree with it and enforce it yet they haven't documented it anywhere such as the guidelines. strange
You need 501 karma for downvoting, that exact number is undocumented on the FAQ page.
https://github.com/minimaxir/hacker-news-undocumented/blob/m...
For anyone else that curious about undocumented stuff, here are some previous discussions with that github link.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16437973 (Feb 2018)
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19212822 (Feb 2019)
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20292361 (June 2019)
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23439437 (June 2020)
It's fine as comments ago, until:
> Downvote brigade has arrived, I love receiving downvotes for playing devil's advocate; respond to me if you're disagreeing, don't downvote and bury what you dislike.
Looking further, the next example is similar, ending with:
> Here on HN, we have our own orthodoxy, too. Those who work with Rust find safe haven for their views, and the downvote brigade on HN will descend if you even mention the word Trump.
Which seems to have been inspired by the next after that, which is an iffy comment in any case, but once again:
> Edit: Apparently someone downvoted this comment within 60 seconds...this seems contrary to HN's ethos. I asked a general question with a specific example; is someone triggered by the words "Donald Trump"? This is pushing a legitimate question about FB's effect on the world down into the gray...is that a good thing?
And so on:
> Edit: Someone want to comment and explain why this is downvoted to -2?
I liberally downvote low-effort, mean, and, if I'm not going to take the time to respond, objectively wrong posts.
More than any of those, though, I downvote people who complain about being downvoted. You lost some Internet points. Who cares?
Word of advice, WhompingWindows: Stop. You're always going to see votes in both directions, but being net negative is usually transient. In your case the downvotes are sticking most likely because you're calling attention to them.