"The shitting on the street example might have been a bit extreme, but it's true."
No, it's not "a bit extreme", because the author of the blog post used the "public" word, not the "streets".
That doesn't necessarily mean "streets". In fact, it could also easily mean Steemit.
When people are commenting a spam-like comment under other people's posts, and self-upvote that comment instead of the original blog post, and with more amount than the pending payout of the original blog post have, then that is equal to "taking a shit in public" in my opinion.
A lot of people are too greedy and too selfish on Steemit.