First and foremost: I am not following Grendel. He was the first person to follow me on Hubski, so he held a special place in my heart... Until I saw he spent most of his time posting a shit-ton of flame bait and filling my feed up with bullshit.

Cool, then I'll follow you.

He was the first person to follow me on Hubski, so he held a special place in my heart...

This is what he does to lure the unwary. He wants to be the first impression to new users of "the typical hubski user". By being the first person to follow new users, he shapes their impression of hubski forever more.

You're not guilty by association, and I want to make a special point about this... I am morally opposed to blocking you, but I feel it is ethically necessary unless you stop following Grendel. I'm finding it difficult to find the part where this isn't guilt by association.

It isn't guilt by association because I'm not making any judgement about you, morally or otherwise. I don't think you've done anything deserving of punishment in your own right.

you're willing to throw others under the bus

You equate "ignoring someone" with "throwing them under the bus". If I block you, all I'm doing is curating my hubski experience.

Hubski, like Reddit, is sort of the opposite of an RSS feed reader. Rather than opting in to get a stream of content from a bunch of different sources, we start with unfiltered everything and have to cut it down. I'm not denying you your hubski experience. I'm just choosing to not allow you to be part of mine. That's my right, and that's nothing to do with hate.