Fist off who cares about being easy on your brakes, and sacraficing your clutch, the clutch is a billion times harder to replace...

Also i think downshifting is bad for your engine because your engine is changing speeds to fast, its just as hard on it as revving your engine.

If your do it right i think its ok, but like if you do it wrong ie let the engine go to idle during the shift, and then release the clutch really fast ramming the engine to 4k in 1/3 of a second, i think THATS bad...it also has to put some stress on your timing belt to have the engine change speeds to quickly...

But just like upshifting, if done right, its fine