Quintessence

The perfect example of one of the main if not the main flaw in the rating and commenting system on this site was highlighted today by some person with a clichéd name in my comments:

'If you werent such an idiot id like you poems, but as it happens you are and idiot, GO TO HELL '

Haha. So, people judge the poet, not the poems. I appreciate this is a known and old fact here, but is it actually possible to solve this problem?

P.S. Downvote my poems please =)

Dear quint,

I do not believe that that will be possible. There will always be some commenter who enjoys being a jerk, and even downrate poems.
The only possibility to fix this would be to make it so you get commenting and voting rights after being on the website, and being appropriately active, for a certain amount of time.
Of course, this would mean more changed, which also means that obviously things haven't been going well with changes around this website.
Were this website to try and solve this problem, i am sure that it would be a while until that happens.
For now, you should just hang in there and report any negative/inappropriates to Bob Shank or one of the mods through a private message.
All you have to do is email the link and tell them which comment to delete.
Hope my insight was helpful.

HAHA. Oh no everyone is bullying me and downrating me I am so sad I need a psychiatrist thank you for helping me darling if feel so much better I won't cut myself tonight thankeeee :)

no problem hun

It would be possible if the poems weren't connected to the poet in anyway... if everything was anonymous. But then that obviously has the problem of maintaining artistic property over your work, etc. SO it would be weird, but not impossible. Not that you care about ratings anyway ; )

So true, I mean I think that if anyone bothers to rate a poem, then it should be rated honestly. It doesn't matter how much you like them or dislike them.