Earlier quoted context omitted.
I would assume any positive effects are balanced out by living in Arkansas.
People downvoted you to the point that your comment is grayed out and about to be hidden but there is hardly metric by which Arkansas is not in the bottom ten on a list of states. Infant mortality rate? 3rd most deadly for babies. Poverty rate? 7th poorest. Homicide rate? 7th most dangerous. Obesity rate? 3rd fattest. Practically any map of any measurable statistic where states are colored red for "bad" and green for…
People vote in good faith, I presume. Sometimes a comment’s factual basis matters less than its overall contribution to a productive and open discussion. Downvotes in this case are an example of HN’s surprisingly effective system for self-moderation working as it should. It isn’t vile enough to censor, but it also isn’t what a lot of readers come here for. It didn’t personally offend me (I didn’t vote either way), but I take occasional downvoting that I don’t fully agree with in stride, as the overall system seems to work better than most.