This for sure is what people want

Not defending xitter, but that's exactly how it works on lemmy, isn't it? If I block someone I don't see them anymore but they can still see and reply to me.

When I've brought this up with the devs, they have shot it down immediately. Basically, their attitude is that posts are public by default. So hiding them from a blocked user doesn't really do anything.
Of course, that's nonsense. Mastodon does it. It has an incredible chilling effect on harassment.
- Oh, I was just making an observation, I'm definitely with you on this, a proper block would be much better,.
- How can you feel harassed if you don't see what a user is replying to you? Unless you pay a lot of attention to usernames...
- It really not. What if just do not want to see their post, for example because low quality or topic i not like? Block is a post/comment filter for feed, nothing more.
  Maybe named wrong if you expect it to be more than it is. But functionality very useful.
  Maybe should be able to block post/comment seperate, sound like good idea.

As far as I've seen, that's how blocking works on literally everything. You are blocking them from your view. You are not blocking their view of you. It wouldn't matter if it worked the other way, since they could just log out and still see everything.

If you want total banishment, run a chat room or a non-public forum that can't even be entered or read without permission.

Mastodon (theoretically) does it like this. They can no longer see your posts.
Reddit says unavailable when you get blocked

"That's how I found my wife!" said divorced man with a restraining order.

Isn’t the problem that posts are public even to users that are not logged in? They probably feel like there’s no point in just forcing stalkers to log off to view them.
But a blocked user would just need to sign out to see all these things anyway. You’re just giving people a false sense of security. Does mastodon prevent non-longed in users from seeing your posts?
- But they can't comment on them. To do that, they'd have to create a new account. And, if they did that, you'd see it and be able to report them (if it's a reportable offense, and, in most cases, it is) or block them (or both).
this is how blocking should work. if you are publishing something to the public, there is no reason to expect others can't see it comment on it

There are pros to this:

If the person you blocked can't see your posts, they can intuit that you've blocked them. Then, they might try and find you on other social media to harass you even further, or shift targets to someone else.

If they can see your posts, they have no idea they've been blocked, similar to Reddit's shadow bans. This might make them think you're just annoyed or rarely look at your DMs, making them invest even more time to uselessly try to contact you.

Of course, I can see the other side too, that you don't want them to know about any (new) posts you've made; but it isn't as one-sided as you seem to think it is.

I disagree. When they don't see your posts, you might as well have gone silent or just post less frequently so they happen to not see them. Besides: once you follow a certain number of people, you don't track each and everyone of them.
Seeing a post makes you more likely to want to answer them. If that doesn't work (as I understand it), you will notice it and maybe be frustrated about it.
Then have two options: block and mute. With mute, users won't know you've muted them, as you've described. With mute, the user would not be able to see your posts.

Just like Lemmy.

If you're still using that service you're part of the problem.

I think this should be default behavior. Countless times, blocking is used to silence disagreement rather than actual harassment. It's used offensively as well: By blocking your political opponents, they can't tell your followers that they're in an echo chamber