To be fair GOG's rules do not say no political discussion. As I remember they say no political discussion unless it has a direct relationship to games and / or gaming.

I understand your thinking, but people who bully others won't stop unless others stand up to them. They'll find more-and-more things they don't like about others and attack more-and-more people. In fact I've seen it -- recently -- over simply enjoying a game they hate and posting a thread for GOG to take a second look at the title.
Many of us have brought up these issues.

"What's with low-rated posts?" Misery loves company. lol

Yep, I agree.

The system has been abused since a while, making it kinda broken by now, but that's only part of the story.
There are a few trolls, scammers and crap people who frankly deserved their reputation.
So, be careful about who you're going to trust here.

The rep system is currently the only way to deal with another bot problem: spam.
You need to earn rep to be able to post links, so newly created accounts can't do it which effectively prevents spam bots from posting links, even if they manage to post their silly messages.
And also the 'downvote' is the first step for spam reporting, you can only report a post as spam if you downvoted it first.

So they can't simply turn off the rep system, or else either nobody or everybody (including spam bots) can post links, and reporting spam would become impossible - or abused instead of the downvote button.

We've made countless suggestions how to at least improve the rep system like:
- disable downvote, or all voting, if you have < 10 rep yourself (would prevent rep abuse via alt-accounts)
- make up-/downvotes public (if you push that button, you show your face)
- allow only a certain number of votes per day
etc. pp.

All of those issues are easily fixed.

1. No negative reputation, only positive with a threshold to post links (maybe 20?). Bots wouldn't gain positive reputation so no worries.

2. A "report" button that's easy to see in the header of every post. This allows easy reportage of spam or posts not conforming to rules.

3. Leave any possible lowering of reputation or forum functionality (like posting links) to the mods' discretion.

Problem solved.

Why does this work better than the current system? Because bullies would have to validate their arguments against other forum members to mods and this would weed out 3/4's or more of these frivolous and mean-spirited attacks... leaving primarily the big issues (real problems) to get reported to mods... which is what we want.

And as to whether reporting would become over-used...

... it's already over-used -- often alongside down-voting. I know. I've been reported for literally nothing; a forum member claimed I was attacking him simply because I didn't agree with him (which I showed the mods and nothing ultimately came of it). So yeah, the whole system is already abused.

The current "report as spam" button does not report anything to any blue. If enough people press this, the post will simply be deleted. And if it's the first of a thread, the thread will go too.
This way mods only have to deal with massive spam waves, single posts are taken care of by the users themselves.

So if you remove the downvote-button, people would use the "report as spam" button to make the "enemies'" posts disappear. Making "report as spam" an "report to blue" button instead of "auto-delete after x reports" is something GOG obviously doesn't want since it would require more manpower to check each and every complaint.

Saving pennies while bleeding dollars is how GOG attracts investors. lol

LOL! Damn...

Turning off JerkMuter is like turning off Ublock Origin on youtube and everywhere else.... Pure chaos on the eyes :D

Just because your biggest problem(i.e. TinyE) is gone doesn't mean you need to leave rude remarks for other users.
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Some, yes, but sadly also a good number are just targets of someone else with bots/alts and too much time on their hands.
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It didn't help against the Bahbah Jee spam, now did it? :|

They could put that button aside from that button/function, like other forums, if they put some effort in.

Turning off the r*p system wouldn't necessarily mean stopping link posting for everyone. I am sure there are workarounds to stop spammers yet allow good posters to post...also as said above: That rep system/etc doesn't stop thread flooding.

Also others can still abuse the spam button as well if they so choose(though they shouldn't)...it just takes twice as many clicks.

Let's be honest....if it were most other sites they'd be doing these things....but gog is cheap with such things and wants to spend more money and time on it's "steam k*ller" galaxy 2.0

That is pants on head ret*rded(pardon my french).

Some could already do this, as I said, by clicking the low rate then report as spam enough times...it just doubles the clicks needed.

I've been low rated for discussing games, even when the discussion is purely about gameplay and doesn't involve anything that could be remotely political, so that advice, unfortunately, doesn't work so well here.

Actually, discussing only games is not enough to avoid the toxic parts of the community, and as I said, not enough to avoid downvotes.

Naturally, this can result in legitimate topics that have had plenty of good discussion being deleted, and that has happened.

What's even worse is that, when this happens to a topic you've posted in, it breaks the "topics i've posted in" list on the main forum page, making it impossible to view past the first five entries.

Until something controversal happens to a well-known game, like that one Baldur's Gate expansion being released to significant controversy, and then we see low rated posts in that game specific forum.

True. "Insult to injury" comes to mind...
That went by me...

Fortunately the game specific forums are mostly about fixing things, mods, gameplay hint etc. So occurrences like this are pretty rare.

You're right, however, you yourself is a part of this "toxic" community... evidenced by your faux pas against GameRager a few days ago.

But then again, your behavior indicate you will never be that introspective to see it and admit it. ;)

Really nice excuse, don't you think? Faulty by choice/design :D

Just like with ordinary crime you need pro-active mods riding along the community, not hiding in the bushes and let the community fend off the criminals themselves while they semi-peek in randomly. GOG has repeatedly sacked those that actually were active. Trying to enforce some good manners by some of in the community will not work all the way.

EDIT: This forum isn't that big - removing the minus button and the report spam button, and have more active mods (some forums enlists community mods as well) and you solve many problems. So it can be done... they just choose to scrub it under the carpet.