There is a rewards pool that is paid out every day. The way that it is decided is by people upvoting and downvoting posts. When you upvote a post you are saying that you think that it deserves more of the rewards pool. When you downvote a post you are saying that it deserves less. Your vote is weighted by how much steem power you have. Everyone has the right to vote how they choose to help us distribute the rewards pool as fairly as possible.

This power can also be abused. People upvote things that shouldn't be upvoted and downvote things that shouldn't be downvoted. You have a whale that is voting on all of your posts giving you a large share of the rewards pool. He has every right to do this but everyone else gets to decide if your posts are worth it. Many people don't think that your posts are worth such a large portion of the rewards pool and more of it should be given to the rest of the community. These people have every right to downvote your posts to spread that potential payout to the rest of the community.

@berniesanders has every right to flag your content for disagreeing with rewards. I think he goes overboard a lot of the time by flagging posts to $0 but everyone has the right to upvote or downvote to decide the value of posts.

No one in entitled to their potential payout. That amount will go up and down depending on when people upvote or downvote your posts. It is not a personal attack if someone disagrees with how much you are getting from the rewards pool.

I think it is abusing voting power when people do what berniesanders is doing by voting posts down to $0 when they are valuable posts like yours. But I think it is also abusing power when people retaliate by downvoting posts out of spite without looking at the content. Downvotes are not punishments to be handed out to our enemies. They are a tool for us to help to spread the reward pool to the best posts.

If you accept your whale upvote, you have to expect some whale downvotes to come with it. Usually it is not because they hate you or think you are a scammer, it is usually just because they are trying to protect the reward pool from all going to a few people. I personally do not agree with berniesanders' tactics, and I don't really know much about him honestly but the principle of protecting the rewards pool is in everyone's best interest.

Just remember, an eye for an eye makes the whole world blind. Just use your upvotes and downvotes for things you think are valuable and don't try to use them as a weapon. The community doesn't like that. Just look at how many people hate berniesanders. If you do the same things he does to "fight back" you are just as bad in most people's eyes.

Sorry for the long post, I just feel like a lot of people don't understand this and it creates a lot of confusion, anger and hurt on this platform.

Good luck!