No, it's not ironic. It's business as usual at HN. Posts get downvoted all the time. In fact, a more recent problem has been people overusing downvotes.

It sounds like you didn't actually understand the dynamics of the HN community. You sound silly insisting your initial impression is even partially right, when the whole community is telling you the opposite. (This applies only to posts, of course. Downvotes still don't exist for stories themselves, outside of flagging.)