However, the existence of ‘free downvotes’ also allows an individual account with a relatively large amount of HIVE Power to significantly and deliberately suppress the author and/or curator rewards of another accountholder. Such behavior has been labeled, by some, as ‘downvote abuse’.

This pretty much sums it up! A handful of very sick big stakers terrorizing the whole platform, disguising it as necessary and valuable (the biggest joke on Hive btw. Everybody knows it, nobody talks about it). Mass user control at it's best! The CIA would turn green with envy, if they could see this... 😉