Take a look at your list of nodes. Go on, you know you want to. See how they sleep there? Laying with their, snuggling up to the list of upvotes and downvotes? Isn't it erotic?
Now focus in on the nodes with as many upvotes as downvotes. No, not the ones with 1 vote up and 1 vote down. Go for the higher ones - 10,20 ... 40. These are your tortured nodes. To me they are your best nodes. They pissed off as many people as they hit a chord with. You made people react - smacked them out of their hypnotic, glazed eye amble through life, and made them vote with conviction. How tortured are your nodes?
Tortured nodes seem to sit on the edge of two or more groups of thought. Various like minded noders sifting the node detritus. Some tortured nodes engage or confront our own understanding of fact. One group sees it wrong (downvote) the other sees it as correct (upvote). But, most tortured nodes seem to challenge what is acceptable to say or node about. One group would say "Oh, that is just sick" (downvote). The other would say "Oh, that is just sick, but funny" (upvote).
I encourage the creation of tortured nodes. What is simultaneously popular and unpopular is often what is the most interesting ground to cover. There should be a tortured node index.