Apologies for the late reply, wefwef ate my reply (but is getting better by the day, I think there were two or three updates just yesterday).
You are exactly spot on. I’ve seen suggestions put forward varying from implementing a karma system, to having admins taking a heavy handed and monolithic approach to community issues, all the way to default non-federation with new instances. All of which, after taking a look around, seem quite “un-Lemmy”. My suggestion is one of perspective and tone. Lemmy has wonderfully rough edges, but I like to think about it like crashing on a friend’s couch vs. staying at a hotel. A more homely experience perhaps, but much more personable.
Let’s get settled in, by all means, but let’s also take a look around and recognize that the system Lemmy and the larger Fediverse have built allowed it to be built not by some multi-billion dollar company or VC funded startup, but by just some regular folks. If that system got us all this far together, there might be something to trust there.