There was definitely a period where the average quality of a comment seemed higher. But those times also coincided with the rise of novelty accounts, power user personalities, often with foul sounding names and awful subreddits. Drama over subreddit bannings is nothing new, either.
Honestly, I'm enjoying the website more today now than I was a few years ago.
Which, I suppose, is the same thing the people say about The Simpsons.