It's a useful deterrent against defenders (actual or bots) coming and drowning people out

That is a good idea. Yeah I often wonder if people that actually are not apart of this community just troll by searches.

I'm sure there are whole companies that do that kind of "reputation management". Modern tech savvy PR firms etc

I personally experienced it when criticising (turns out quite rightly) the HS2 rail project. The difference in replies on Reddit whether I wrote HS2 or eg |-|S2 or H/S/2 was stark