Post history can be a useful tool to help determine if someone's asking questions in bad faith

Not to downvote them, that's petty, but if they say something nuts, I do sometimes look at their history to see what other nuts things they've said.

Hah, no. I barely look at someones username. Instead I focus on the comment itself.

I read through the user profile to decide whether or not to block them. Don't bother with voting from their profile.

Yeah, all the time. It's the easiest way to identify a troll from a random idiot. I don't have a problem with random idiots, if someone genuinely likes Trump and believes in authoritarianism, that is fine by me. I don't like them, but at least they're engaging in good faith. I can understand and work with that.

But, when their comment history is full of pushing people's buttons or a wide, inconsistent variety of opinions, then it becomes pretty clear that being shocking is the goal itself. That's an obvious troll, and should be dealt with as one.

edit: Note, I don't bother voting while I'm there, so I answered inaccurately. I'm just sleuthing to find out if engaging at all is worth my time. If it is a troll, I actually don't downvote anything, as large downvote tallies amuse them. If it's probably not a troll, I don't downvote then either, but I know I can go back to the original comment and actually talk to this person like a human being without wasting my own time.

So, actually I don't downvote through people's comment history. I do skim quickly through them though, reading for good-faith engagement. Or a lack of it.

I don't upvote very often either, since I'm reading and scrolling too fast to bother. Unless I run into a really good post or something, enough to make me stop skimming for a second.

I'm hoping that doesn't happen here. That was a huge problem on reddit. Can we just not bring all the bad things about reddit here? Like Whose Line is it Anyway, the points are made up and nothing matters. Just enjoy this.

I pay no attention to post history when it comes to voting behaviour; posts are as they are. I’m not much of a downvoter; it’s upvote or nothing unless a post is straight up awful inappropriate for the community it is in.

If it’s a niche subject that I’m interested in, I look at their post history in case they’ve found discussions that I’ve missed.

If it’s a particularly good, funny, extreme or otherwise “out there” post I do look at the post history for entertainment value, learning or just morbid curiosity.

Knowing that up and downvotes are public (if not on the user profile through the API, so any crawler/3rd party app has access afaik) I avoid voting at all. I think it's bad design and really hinders my engagement with posts.

No but sometimes I do the opposite. If someone responds to me answering a difficult question I was stumped by, or has linked to something I find cool I’ll check their profile to see if they’ve posted anything else that’s cool.

As others have said, I only look through someone's profile if they've said something batshit insane because I want to see what else they've said. It's why I sometimes scroll through conservative or religious communities on Lemmy if the post shows up in new. I don't downvote, I just chuckle.

Only if they seem suspicious to me as trying to push some kind of idea. Usually posts with leading questions such as "anyone else notice the anecdotal negative experience portrayed as norm", comments where someone blames a demographic for something, posts that are on topic but have a blatant other purpose meant to start shit (such as cat pics in c/cats held by soldiers), etc.

In too many cases, the user is really adamant about whatever they have to say, and I just end up blocking them.

No, but if its an argument I might look at some other comments to see if their being purposely obtuse, if they are having this argument with anyone else, or if they are just filled with bad takes. I won't upvote or downvote those though.

The most preferred way to engage with toxic people are to downvote the post/comment in question, report them, and block them. Trawling their history like that would make me even unhappier, voting being anonymous or not.

I don't care enough about votes to even vote, much less stalk someone. I don't even understand why people care about votes.

I'll admit I've done it to the Reddit admin that cheated on r/place last year

Only when the person I argued with brings up something from my profile first. Was having an argument with someone who was claiming I'm misogynistic (can't remember the context). Then they brought up something from my profile and I criticized them for the same. When I went through their profile they were giving suggestions to people about red light places to visit in the Phillipines...

Wasn't this called brigade down voting? At any rate, I never engaged in this behavior because it is petty

Not specifically in order to do upvote or downvote, but I enjoy looking through profiles when someone is interesting or seems extremist etc. While I'm there I might do some voting. I'm most interested in people who are either very nuanced (rare these days) or off-the-wall extreme.

I mainly look at profiles to see people's avatars. I just think they're neat.

Never, I have many better things to do with my time. I'm honestly astonished that anyone can be bothered. I downvote the comment if I really dislike it and move right along

Not to vote on their stuff, no - but definitely, when I see a take that's shitty/stupid/weird enough, I'll have a peek to see if they're taking the piss, or trolling, or something.

No. That's disgusting. I want to argue with arguments, not with people.

No, I don't. But sometimes I trawl a user profile to try and understand the person who made the comment a bit better.

I usually downvote rude comments. But if they have a genuine point to make and that's the tone they take in all their comments, I'll assume that they're simply a bit awkward and don't know they're being rude.

If i see someone post something insane and harmful i'll check out the profile and downvote the other harmful stuff on the front page of their profile page, upvotes i'm more liberal with and i don't visit profiles to upvote their other comments.

No I never look at a users profile even. You will agree on some things with someone you may not even like.