> downvoting into oblivion articulate comments not at all devoid of content really has become endemic here, and many (though certainly not all) of those I read anyway were obviously downvoted for disagreement, often political

Maybe I'm biased, but I personally had the opposite feeling, the majority of the comments I see grayed out are usually somehow aggressive/salty rants that don't really try to bring anything useful to the thread, and the few other ones are comments with technical details that are plain wrong.