While that's true, expecting bad maintainership to not have any effect and third parties not discussing about the quality of the software is also delusion. (And in practice, maintainers maintain, and I'm glad they do, because otherwise e.g. Linux distro would be complete absolute crap.)
What is also a in the realm of possibilities is that a project gets a bad reputation and for indirect effects or others, dies. That happened here. However, in the effects we saw here, while the people proposing patches and debating in a civil way about technical flaws (or at the very least widely perceived as such) were fine, the brigading was absolutely inexcusable, as well as the unproductive/nasty comments.
What is also a in the realm of possibilities is that a project gets a bad reputation and for indirect effects or others, dies. That happened here. However, in the effects we saw here, while the people proposing patches and debating in a civil way about technical flaws (or at the very least widely perceived as such) were fine, the brigading was absolutely inexcusable, as well as the unproductive/nasty comments.