Frankly I do not see the point of downvoting or bragging about it, and your explanation does not make it right either.
Each of your comments detracted from the conversation,
You single handedly decided what detracts from the conversation, and I am sure you are not HN spokesman.
It's like "an eye for an eye", but in this case you are hurting someone because you disagree with their opinion or the way they expressed it (and yes, I understand sometimes some users can be disrespectful).
But even when someone is clearly not following the HN guidelines, they should simply be reminded of it, then ignored forever.
The "free hand" in HN will auto-regulate them. That is the same free hand that does not upvote spam links.
Downvoting comments "should not be" just as downvoting stories "is not". Silence is by far the best way to respond to ignorance.
This thread was specifically made for conversation about how those 3 comments were voted, I dont think that counts as "bragging"
While they didnt add "in my opinion" I think its more than obviously implied that it was his opinion that he was stating, and was not attempting to speak on behalf of anyone else.
and the original poster stated that comments detract from the conversation should be downmodded, I agree that all 3 were somewhat insulting and added no value to the conversation, while I may be a relatively new user, they all seemed out of spirit (in my opinion)
Except the entire point of allowing users to downvote comments is to promote civility. If someone is not being civil, then they should be downvoted. This is a clearer and less distracting means of telling someone what's not appreciated.
At least, this is my understanding of how pg intends the system to be used.
Yes, my understanding of the site culture is precisely that downvoting is to show that a comment doesn't contribute to the discussion, rather than to show factual disagreement with the comment. This thread here is a discussion about a submission that suggests not everyone is interpreting downvoting in the same way, and that is a legitimate issue to explore here, as long as we are all in metadiscussion mode.
Frankly I do not see the point of downvoting or bragging about it, and your explanation does not make it right either.
Each of your comments detracted from the conversation,
You single handedly decided what detracts from the conversation, and I am sure you are not HN spokesman.
It's like "an eye for an eye", but in this case you are hurting someone because you disagree with their opinion or the way they expressed it (and yes, I understand sometimes some users can be disrespectful).
But even when someone is clearly not following the HN guidelines, they should simply be reminded of it, then ignored forever.
The "free hand" in HN will auto-regulate them. That is the same free hand that does not upvote spam links.
Downvoting comments "should not be" just as downvoting stories "is not". Silence is by far the best way to respond to ignorance.