I agree with you. Internet forums were better before likes/etc.

Before you had to state an opinion to engage any idea. Which drives conversations. You had to stake your reputation via alias. Which is why forums build such strong communities.

There were certainly downsides and old style forums don’t scale well for modern user levels.

But I think the defaultism of likes/voting lowers the bar of participation and in doing so also fundamentally lowers the quality of any conclusions derived therein.