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We might subjectively disagree over how tactful or not it is to call someone's post "weird" in this context. But the point is, I don't think 16 people downvoted that post because it called the parent post "weird". I think 16 people downvoted that post because it questioned how committed Republicans were to the principles of the anti-lockdown cause.
Posts with sharper personal insults than "weird" still manage to accumulate upvotes, if the content itself is popular enough. I already linked one. It's not that hard to find others (from multiple different users).
But these people are simply correct in many cases. In every community with reddit-style voting, posts that disagree with the consensus viewpoint are more likely to be downvoted. This is simply obvious to me based on 15+ years of watching how different internet communities behave, and my knowledge of how I personally use the voting buttons, particularly with posts that provoke a strong emotional reaction from me. I can't recall any significant counterexamples, and TheMotte is no exception.
I want to reiterate that using the vote button as an agree/disagree button isn't a bad thing. It's natural and unavoidable. The solution is to simply not have any punishment associated with a low comment score. It's already a good first step that TheMotte doesn't hide low scoring comments like reddit and HN do, and I think we should remove the rate limiting as well.
The thing that would tempt me most to downvote that (I didn't) was the following sentence:
I think there are other factors besides density and poverty: most importantly, policing.
That said, I agree with the overall thesis that people downvote for disagreement, and more than I would prefer. I would be happier with downvoting for disagreement when what is going on in someone's head is closer to "that point in that comment is wrong" than "I don't like their team."
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I have no disagreement with your opinion on the pattern of upvotes and downvotes in this case specifically, at The Motte more generally, and in places with such systems even more generally. If anything, I'd say it is a bad thing, but it's indeed natural and unavoidable. Which is why I find complaining about it to be silly and pointless. It's like whining that the Sun rises in the east.
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