What's with the 'Rating' and downvote options?

I am struggling to see anything positive coming from having the ability to rate peoples posts from 1 to 5 stars. Do the developers/forum owners realise we are a pool of people who tend to struggle regulating our emotions and likely have strong RSD? Of all places to be able to downvote or poorly rate someone's comment - geez, you'll have folk off worrying what they done wrong, feeling unfairly treated or ruminating for days over a low score. I suspect I am not alone here, but as a software engineer myself, this has to be one of the worst features I've ever seen on such a site. I've seen people post with such emotion and detail, struggling to find a voice and then seeing a 1 star rating on it and it really bothers me. I hate to think what the other person is then thinking after seeing this. 

If any product owner/manager reads these or there is a feedback section, you should strongly consider removing this option and instead simply have upvotes with the point being, the most upvoted content gets shown first (... Reddit ... cough, cough ...)

Parents Reply
  • I think mine comes from my mother. She loves conflict and it is impossible to convince her she is wrong about anything. My brain absolutely shuts down when I need to defend my position, but she is able to stand her ground. I think that’s why I’m so meek and tend to just disappear when conflict arises.

    but do you ever wonder if the reason you're so afraid of it is that if you start, you just won't stop until you feel like justice has been served?

    Weirdly it’s the opposite for me; I am afraid that once a debate happens it won’t stop until the other person gets “justice” over me.

Children