I apologize for butting in, but I hope to improve the resolution of your discussion. My understanding from reading Hurt's posts and comments is that he has a cutoff for downvoting posts at a KE of 10. So, if your KE was 10 or below, he wouldn't downvote you if I read and remember correctly.

I understand that holding off for a while on spending your earnings on Hive might be very difficult. But there are people you know that don't have Hive earnings, so such difficulty cannot be unknown to you. I know, and you are observing, that Hurt is a very reasonable person who is prone to compromise for the sake of comity. I bet that if you propose to lower your KE to 10 or below, and ask Hurt to help you achieve that KE by not flagging away rewards while you're building them up, he will at least hear you out.

Rather than discussing whether it's right or wrong to DV you, or for you to eat occasionally, I think if you guys try to help each other, him to help you lower your KE by not DV'ing you while you're HODLing your stake, and you to help him strengthen Hive by lowering your KE to 10 or below, that you could come to agreement and end the flags from him on your account.

I recommend trying. I argue with him all the time and he doesn't get mad at me unless I insult or malign him, which I don't want to do anyway when I'm trying to persuade somebody to a different course of action than they have set on. I hope ya'll can work it out.