The mod banning these users is the same mod who made the posts they downvoted. This is mod abuse, turning the downvote button into an auto-self-ban button.
The message is “If you disagree with me, you will be banned”
Monitoring and banning users for using lemmy as intended to signal boost your opinion should be grounds to have all mod privileges removed. This behaviour undermines the integrity of the server and the wider fediverse.
FWIW the account you are using now hasn’t been banned from anything.
Thanks. Good to know. My account on this instance is pretty new. If I remember correctly, those bans happened to my piefed account.