When you get downvoted, just wait a bit. It seems in the last two years or so we acquired some trigger-happy idiots. It still usually balances out in the end.
I don't really have a problem being downvoted, and I've certainly seen what you describe happen many times in the past. I was asking not so much to prevent downvoting, but because I couldn't see what I'd said that could lead people to want to downvote, and hoped to have a chance either to win them over or have them win me over.
