Your theory is highly plausible. It would explain why the majority of these witnesses (some of whom are vegan, slash, non-aggression-principled folks too - @jerrybanfield @teamsteem etc) are not opposed to this type of abuse of the flag feature - I had @themarkymark, (this links to his admission of doing so) small flag as he calls it, an unrelated post a few days ago, merely because I questioned one of his bots that are supposed to be fighting a war against spam.

Highly non-aggressive actions: as teamsteem said it: as long as they don't do anything violent or was it aggressive I can't remember his exact choice of words.