It's a common line of thought that often surfaces and it is listed in the HN guidelines as one of the things that should not be insinuated. So that's why your parent is getting downvoted.
However, @dang suggests there is nothing HN can do to insulate us from "sufficiently smart manipulators." [1]
[1] https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&so...