We could avoid much downvote drama by splitting the downvote into curator and author votes.
IF curators could choose which to punish they could punish 'bad' authors without punishing the equally 'bad' curators for voting rewards to them, and vice versa.
There are no bad posts, only bad curation.™
This feature would have avoided much of the current mess surrounding downvoting as when the vote can't be split 'good' authors got downvoted because 'bad' curators were denied rewards.
I ran it past a whale and he was concerned with malicious use, but we have to groom this crowd somehow.
Without customs and traditions this crowd will be a mob.
IF this feature had been available when the flagwars were happening far fewer authors would have been collateral damage.
Tanking the platform's reputation in the market with it.
I don't think it is that simple but I think this is 90% correct.
I do think what you are saying would be a more elegant approach. I am mostly worried it would not work exactly as we hope and create issues we do not expect.
That being said, this would get whale fights away from authors that "don't deserve it" which I think would be a good idea.
This would be a good way for manual curators who do not like auto voting to just focus on the autovotes versus downvoting the whole account.