The cons are pretty bad imo. It’s common on Reddit now for people to get into an argument, reply and then immediately block to prevent a response and make it look like that person didn’t care to respond. If someone is a poweruser and responsible for a meaningful portion of posts and spawned comment threads in a community, they can use the block function to strategically limit the ability of certain other users to participate, since a blocked person can not only not reply to them but also can’t reply to anyone else further down a thread. This effect is worse in smaller subs, it’s basically soft moderation powers granted just by blocking and writing things that generate engagement. And when this is happening, by its nature it is hard to even tell it’s happening.
The cons are pretty bad imo. It’s common on Reddit now for people to get into an argument, reply and then immediately block to prevent a response and make it look like that person didn’t care to respond. If someone is a poweruser and responsible for a meaningful portion of posts and spawned comment threads in a community, they can use the block function to strategically limit the ability of certain other users to participate, since a blocked person can not only not reply to them but also can’t reply to anyone else further down a thread. This effect is worse in smaller subs, it’s basically soft moderation powers granted just by blocking and writing things that generate engagement. And when this is happening, by its nature it is hard to even tell it’s happening.