Some of your code review is not understanding that Piefed handles things differently. So in the context of blocking, if someone blocks you on piefed - you simply can't reply to them anymore. This isn't out of sync with how many services operate. Now Lemmy does not operate like this, but the disconnect between how Lemmy and Piefed handle it cause discrepencies like this.

if your reply contains a blocked_phrase, it won't accept the comment.

This code exists, but is unused to my knowledge. Certainly for Piefed.social.

I also do not see this as inherently bad as it can be used to stop slurs.

If your account is created_very_recently and the reply contains an em dash (—) it sends a notification to the admins

This is anti-AI checking functions. Most of the other things you refer to generally here within the code are simply mitigation tools against spam, trolls and AI posters.