I think downvotes should be reserved for plagiarism, spam, and hate speech. Opinion based flagging is ruining this environment.
I'd suggest debating that with Dan. He's far more influential when it comes to Steem/it than I am. He and others believe that downvoting based on value and rewards is essential. Perhaps you can change his mind. If there is a general shift on this, or possibly design changes in the system to address the issues another way, then I would be happy to adjust. But for now I do think it is needed.
I recognize and to some extent agree with what you wrote about not disheartening brand new users who finally have a successful post, but frankly I don't see that as even happening. Certainly neither @ozchartart nor @krnel fit that description.
Well, I have seen it happening. My memory is not the best, but I'm sure in one recent instance the username was something like @tim. It is happening, and it's disheartening not only the ones who suffer it, but people who will in turn put less effort into their posts because they think, why put so much effort into this when it might get flagged anyway..
I want to take a moment to thank you for being able to converse in a mature manner. In responding to other messages, your adult demeanor becomes more evident.
I'm pretty sure that it happened to me back in the week of August 7th, unless there's another explanation for how my reputation reached 55.59 that week and was down to 40.24 by the next week (data pulled from steemwhales.com).
I can see that you still haven't regained your lost reputation as of yet.
I feel you should have responded to @smooth's comment with this rather than mine, because I know this is happening. It is he/she that seems to be unaware of it.
I will give you a follow and resteem anything you post that I enjoy so that you might get back some of your lost rep at a quicker rate.
EDIT: It appears I'm already following you. You must have impressed me prior to this post.