Should Plants be pruned?

Stoopid noob question here! Should a grower prune off some of the bigger fan leaves during flowering to expose the budsites to more light or will this hurt the plant more than help?

No, these are the factories for the conversion of the fertilizers to usable food for the plant. The growth is coming from the leaves not the buds.

^My beliefs, exactly.

not fan leaves .. altho i do prune off smaller branches near the bottom leaving about 1ft of room between the lowest branch and soil surface.. should give better growth up top and airflow

less leaves = less bud!

One of the biggest debates out there. However, I can speak from experience. I had 6 big buds under 600watt hps lights on 12/12. I cut all the fan leaves on 1 of the 6 plants to test this theory. I found that the buds did stretch but were very thin and had very little weight on them. Also, my bud was a little more harsh on that one, possible due to chemicals not being able to exhaust via the fan leaves. In all, the plant weighed alot less than the others and didn't taste as good.

I would keep the fan leaves on the plant and only take them off when they turn very yellow and are half falling off anyway.

what about the very bottom few nodes I usually shear them off completely to increase upper growth and increase lower airflow. It seems to make denser flowers and those bottom nodes never produce anything worth burning. IDK may be I shouldnt do it but isn't a valid technique called it lollipoping? I keep upper fan leaves or the fan leaf of any kept flower site.