I downvoted your whinge about getting downvoted for the following reasons:
(1) meta discussions must die
(2) pretending that upvotes/karma matter is just deluding yourself. Go watch the Southpark episode about internet dollars until you get it
Both mentions were probably more part social commentary than complaint. I mean it was already completely grey, and isn't the whole point of fading out comments so that other people aren't bothered by them? If so then fading out does not work because that comment was downvoted 20+ times. So after the first -4, we had 16 other people highlight the comment, read it, and downvote it. That's a broken system.
And notice I derisively referred to it as a signed integer - that was deliberate because in the great wide universe that is my life, an integer stored in database somewhere is something I care eternally less about than the content of my comments and the realization I hoped to spur...