I posted this in John Douglas diary. It probably should have just went straight here.

One of the few things the trolls have said that I agree with is that we need viewing thresholds. As on Slashdot, most severely negative ratings are deserved. Once something has been sent to the basement, I don't want to see it. "here-to-attack-you", scatboy, and so-forth have wasted enough of our energy.

I have no problems with others even PRs seeing the zeroed posts. Also as on Slashdot, the trolls can "just be here to attack us" in the under one basement. I think level 2 would be a good default threshold with anyone able to at least temporarily change it for that page view. Yes, even PRs. The code would have to be smart enough not to hide posts that are zeroed because they are unrated.

Since thresholds would be at an individual viewer's discretion, they'll have little reason to complain of censorship.