"...a shit post to some may not be a shit post to others..."

This is the reality of social media. None of us are gods and righteous arbiters of what is good content. We can define spam, but must differentiate between spam and shitposts to have a real definition. Furthermore, if we want a popular social site, then we can't impose elitist standards. Shitposts that get upvoted have a real market, and are properly allowable posts. Hundreds of thousands of users have been driven off the platform for shitposting by elitist tools and now our token isn't $10, but $.10.

Great job, assholes!

Here's a thought. If a post isn't your cup of tea, don't read it. Don't upvote it. If it isn't a threat to society, it's none of your business. HW and certain whales have used various excuses to flag ~1m users off the platform so that ~36 whales could continuously maintain a bare majority of stake and thereby maintain complete control of the witnesses and rule Hive regardless of what the minority of stake (although the majority of users) thinks about it. These whales extract >90% of the inflation from the rewards pool, and the rest of us feed on the crumbs that fall from their bloated maws.

The lack of users depresses token price, but enables the whales to keep a death grip on governance, and guarantees their continued extraction of the vast majority of wealth from the platform. I consider that glaringly short sighted, comparable to a petty thief that steals a kid's lunch money once by beating him up (guaranteeing he'll hide his lunch money from you after that) instead of extorting him for all of his lunch money during all four years of high school by using photoshop to fake a pic of him with some ugly girl or something. That's the result of knowing nothing more about investing (or extortion) than 'Cash is King'.

"...why are they even still here?"

Maybe they don't like being bullied. Maybe they think bullies are a detriment to society and are willing to stand up to them to defend the rest of us. You might ask them. Maybe they're the heroes we need, but don't deserve. I have learned from time to time people I follow and whose content I quite enjoy were being flagged. I began using the beneficiary function of Peakd to dedicate 1/4 of my author rewards to such good folks to encourage them to keep posting, however it often wasn't enough (I don't earn phat bank from my posts) and folks kept leaving. Some while back I began using the tip function to donate a hive to each of their posts and comments on my blog I found relevant. That has worked better to keep folks posting here, despite being flagged by HW continuously for some error or obnoxious opinion years ago, which was my goal.

I don't want to destroy Hive and run off it's users, whether I agree with them or not. One of the accounts I used to support was at times rabidly insulting to me, in fact. @baah was a relentless troll, and society (especially Hive society) needs relentless trolls to keep us honest and on our toes, so I supported him (although I once muted him because he just wouldn't shut up about something or other I was over - the only time I recall ever muting anyone on Hive). Sadly I no longer get to enjoy his irascible rants, and he seems to have moved on to a gloomier bridge to lurk under. I want Hive's user base to grow, and increase the value of our token. So, I do what I can to encourage the heroes that stand up to bullies here when I feel it's necessary.

With the unfunding of HW, I've been able to re-target more substantial creators to support with the beneficiary function, and have quit hemorrhaging Hive as tips, which is good, because my account can grow faster and be more helpful to the community in the future.

"... I will start by putting a stop to sending kiss emojii's..."

Excellent example. I too will never again send a kiss emoji on Hive. Flag me into dust if I do.

Thanks!