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The mod banning these users is the same mod who made the posts they downvoted. This is mod abuse, turning the downvote button into an auto-self-ban button.
The message is "If you disagree with me, you will be banned"
Monitoring and banning users for using lemmy as intended to signal boost your opinion should be grounds to have all mod privileges removed. This behaviour undermines the integrity of the server and the wider fediverse.
It is not reasonable to demand that every user that disagrees with a post publish their own counter-post. It's excessive, inefficient, and is antithetical to how the fediverse functions. Post voting is the bare minimum of participation. If that's still too "chilling", this is simply the wrong forum for what you're looking for, and trying to force the whole platform to bend to what you want it to be is just selfish.
I think our schism is philosophically intractable. I don't see the fediverse as one single homogeneous space. I see it as many small pools of heterogeneous activities and people. That can cross pollinate, cross communicate, and cross collaborate.
You're also asking the entire platform to bend to your will, to allow you to express your negativity wherever you like. I don't think that's sustainable for Lemmy either.
I agree that's how the fediverse should operate, and you're explicitly arguing to disallow this at your lone discretion. Your entire ethos that you're touting is about excluding those not part of your personal group. That's the exact opposite of open and collaborative.
No, I'm saying mods like you shouldn't be allowed to abuse the openness of the fediverse while refusing to be subject to the same system everyone else is.
The public votes on the content of the forum. If that's unacceptable to you, then that's on you, not the forum.