I believe people should be able to downvote whatever they want. People should be allowed to go against the hivemind. PieFed implements pseudonymous downvoting. For anyone worried about spam, they have powerful tools to allow admins to filter out people who do not contribute to the community, e. g. just go around downvoting everything.

[–] AwesomeLowlander@sh.itjust.works 2 points 14 hours ago (1 children)

I have no problems with people downvoting stuff. But if you're willing to downvote something, you should be willing to stand by it instead of being anonymous.

[–] coldsideofyourpillow@lemmy.cafe 1 points 14 hours ago* (last edited 9 hours ago) (1 children)

Sometimes though there can be cases of harassment based on downvotes. I won't mention no names, but recently I saw someone on Lemmy reveal (with evidence) how they were sent death threats and were harassed for something FAR more petty. If people like that can exist, then I don't even want to imagine what can happen when your disapproval of a person's opinions is public.

[–] AwesomeLowlander@sh.itjust.works 1 points 13 hours ago

Here's the thing. Downvotes ARE public, just with a slightly higher barrier to access. Bad actors like that? Slightly higher barriers aren't an issue, they will walk barefoot over broken glass to mess with you. The issue under consideration here is whether to remove that barrier so normal users (not crazy ones) can access the same info that others can.