I thank you all for you input.
I really like the work that was put into the viewing of posts under the current filter (posts below the standard of the set filter are grayed out). However, I feel as if some people either don't understand my point, or just blatantly disagree with it. To the latter, you can either try to educate yourselves more or ignore the rest of my rant and continue to the tl;dr.
Thing is, I don't think that a thread in which you post how much you think so and so's baby is so cute or how cool you think it is that this person is gay should have anything to do with your overall karma score. If someone says something stupid, sure, by all means, please rate it into oblivion. But in the specific off-topic forums, such as the OoT, the Asylum, perhaps even the Multi-game forum, rate-downs should not affect a posters karma score. However, I would still want them to show below the set filter preference.
At it's core, as far as I can tell, the karma system was meant to weed out posters who are posting asinine information. This came before there was an OoT or an Asylum. The latter were created so a clique-esque group could post without interrupting the regular flow of traffic. That's all fine and well, but as far as I know, certain posters have posted exclusively in those forums and have had their posts rated beyond the clouds.
Likewise, let's say a poster such as Varus were to post into the WoW or FFXI main ... under the basic default filter, no one would be able to see their post. One or two red arrows and it would be unrated, meaning NO ONE would be able to see their post. What if it was something helpful to that specific community? Since I'm a moogle ******, let's say Varus all of a sudden started his own .dat mining thread and with every update posted all of the new update's info. This is something beneficial to the community, and should be welcomed. However, because of his rating in the Asylum, he would be hard-pressed to meet the sub-d'd standards. No matter how much his posts benefited the GAMING community (which this site was meant to benefit), he would be without notice.
I've been on Allakhazam since late '03, and my interest in the OoT and the Asylum is minimal. I lurk, but I don't post. Not for fear of rate-downs, just because I don't have anything to add that someone else hasn't already said. I really don't care about my own karma score, and I only post when I feel I have something worthwhile to contribute to a thread. That is what I feel posters should be rated on. This website is first and foremost a gaming community. The sub-cultures that are created within should not dictate whether or not a post is viewable by the community at large.
tl;dr, posts in off-game forums should have nothing to do with a poster's karma score. Any ratings gained up until now can remain. Posters should be rated based on their contribution to the site as a gaming website, and not as a post-something-interesting-and-if-you-keep-it-up-we'll-accept-you website.