I suspect a lot of the 'toxicity' and ill-feeling complained of in the game can find its roots in port control battles. It's become so high-stakes with billion-plus pops yet it is all so easily destroyed with a handful of cards cast at the opportune moment. So much gold has to be sunk into each port on a daily basis to preserve influence stacks which again can be destroyed in ten minutes.
It's just a battle of cards and gold and who can shovel mostest fastest. That attacks can be made and ports flipped without revealing the true attacker just makes for paranoia and distrust : pretty good seed bed for toxicity in my view.
It all adds up to stress and frustration which then spills out into ill-temper and equally toxic retaliations. I'd reckon better than half of port voodoo cast has no hope of changing the ownership of a port but gets cast just to piss folk off.
My conclusion is that port control needs overhauling : attacks can happen in ten minutes : nation responses are hindered by three-day votes. Which usually ends up being 71 hours too late. Meantime the port owners can pretty much only sit and fume or throw more of their own personal assets into the hole.
I'll add a last comment. : since I got out of port nonsense I have found the game to be more enjoyable, less stress-inducing and my interactions with other players have relaxed too.