pg asserted that downvoting is fine to be used for disagreement in Feb 2008, when HN was less than a year old:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=117171

I don't care about pg tho

The point is simply that he set the pattern for this site.

Things have to change at some point, that's why Guido is taking a permanent vacation.

The assertion being made, that you seemed to be endorsing, was that downvoting used to be only for incivil or troll comments, but that has changed recently under the newer moderation team.

As pg’s 2008 quote shows, that assertion is wrong.

Whether it should change now is a separate issue, but there seems to be no mood for that among the more active contributors to HN.