Doesn't that seem a little power crazy to you that so many users can be essentially crippled permanently over a disagreement? Like, from what I can tell from this post, the OP seems polite but skeptical, willing to accept evidence contrary to what they think. The user has even resteemed a sweetsssj post not too long ago.

It's perfectly fine for whales to simply ignore the answers... It's not abusive to keep pushing to find an answer one is looking for.

Perhaps an op's post is pointless or dumb or wrong, but I've rarely seen one which is threatening or abusive.

I feel if somebody is trolling unnecessarily, they should be punished in some way but A) We need criteria laid out as what is considered unacceptable behaviour and B) pretty much permanently crippling an account that otherwise seems to be an honest account isn't the answer.

The arbitrary nature of downvoting on this website is one of the worrisome things I think should be addressed. I mean, I'm worried that If this post annoys you, I can say goodbye to the dozens of hours of hard work I've put into this site, and I'm literally out of a job as of a couple of weeks ago so that could be devastating.

Edit - Also 'So today I was cyberbullied on Steemit and continuously received harassing messages from a member that included assault and threats.

The member also threatened to gang up on me and have his Steemit friends flag my blog post and replies so he could lower my reputation score. My reputation score is now down to 4.'

Is this really acceptable simply because the balance of power leans that way?