I actually wrote a post about this earlier today...
Just to kind of summarize here's my thoughts. The bots have become a big part of Steemit and what it is.
I feel like voting bots have ruined quality content on the trending and hot pages. I also feel like this platform has become more about gaming the system than creating quality content and or being part of a community.
I do however think if bots were banned tomorrow I think Steemit would suffer, all the whales as well as voting bots would pull their money out of the system, as supply and demand works that would cause the price to tank. When prices tank people don't spend as much time on here and people put less time into creating quality content. In the short term I think it would hurt Steemit, if it survived which I think it would I think it would be good for Steemit in the longterm.