Abuse is subjective. I perceive vote buying to be abuse. Isn't the flag for downvoting things we perceive as abuse?

Vote buying defeats the whole purpose of what we are doing here. Curation means nothing with vote buying. Our voices mean nothing because nobody values their vote. People keep saying "the markets decide" but it's quite clear that if people who will voice that they do not agree with something but they will not vote against it then the market is not deciding. They refuse to decide because they either perceive the downvote as some kind of attack or because they feel their vote can always be countered.

Correct me if I'm wrong but I believe the flag was introduced before the voting scale. I could understand when I came to the platform first why the downvote was changed to a flag since any downvote by a whale could send a post straight to $0.00. But originally the downvote was used almost as frequently as the upvote to decide whether a post should be rewarded more or less.

Now since we have that scale, I think the flag should come back down - though it may be too late to change people's perceptions of the downvote now since it's been a flag for so long.