An Interesting Observation

I've been rather bemused the last several days as folks have come out of the woodwork to say that I'm a troll.

Please, enlighten me as to what trolling is. As of now, I can only think that it is being new and having high posting volume.

But please, enlighten me.

Oh look, the passive aggressive clinical approach.

No, you got it all wrong. People just don't like YOU. You're a dipshit. And threads like this don't help.

Just play along nice and things will change for the better.

What, in your opinion, does playing along nice look like?

Forget it man. You're more fun just the way you are. Now bend over and start whistling.

Why would I bend over for the likes of you?

OK, forget it. Go get me some lunch.

Because it's twue. It's twue, it's TWUE!!!

Of course we all know that it really was Bart's arm that mistakenly drew that comment in the uncut originals. Does that mean you're calling for an anal fisting?

Try looking at it this way: Remember when you were in the fifth grade and you'd say something to someone that got you beaten up? Remember how you never learned from that experience, and kept getting beaten up, even though you were bigger than the other kids? Remember how you used to think When I'm a grown up, I'll buy a lot of gunz and then if they try to beat me up, I'LL SHOW THEM!!!!?

That's what you do, and then some. How many times have you called a woman a cockhole to her face?

Now think about how many times you've abandoned one church and joined another because the pastor said something you didn't want to hear. Reflect upon how you might change your behavior. Or just keep moving from one message board to another because obviously there's something wrong with the board, not with your attitude.

Hope that helps.

I've... never left a church for any reason other than moving. I didn't get beat up growing up (well, once when I moved, but we took care of that guy).

Mewa, why do you have to quote her? I've been feeling so at peace by not reading her.

So do you really call female members cockhole???

I called Jenee a cockhole. She might be a female - that's the online persona she's assumed at least.

Rest assured, I would never call you that though, Daddy.

Did that point ruffle your hair as it went right over your head?

Because there are people like me, garamet an T'bonz who know you from TBBS...
And you are a thin-skinned troll over-there...
You are a lousy troll btw...

Yes, that's my online persona. You can buy one at Wal-mart pretty cheap. They even have some personas that are pretty personable. You should check out a few of those, apostle.

wow.....that was lame.

apostle, how often do you call women cockholes to their faces?

Would someone please quote this so that Mr. "I Can Say Whatever I Want, But I'm So Thin-Skinned I Have to Ignore You" can read it?

Lame trolls don't deserve the very best.

Glad to be of service.

yea. so was your need to call attention to it.

Let's try coming at this from another angle: you got tired of TBBS, presumably because you got tired of getting bitchslapped. You assumed that it was because TBBS is a den of "libruhls". So you came to WordForge, which you assumed was more "conservative" and therefore would be a friendlier place for you. Instead you come over here and immediately get bitchslapped even worse. Is it possible that you just don't come across as a very likebale perso and that what you regard as witty, the great majority of posters of every political stripe find obnoxious, witless and inane and not because of some libruhl conspiracy?

I'm not saying that's the problem, just asking you to consider the possibility.

Actually, I enjoy this place immensely more than TBBS. It's fun here - people have a little bit of personality. The only folks I have any problems with here are folks that had problems with me at Trekbbs. For some reason, Jenee followed me over here.

Not really.

From my observations, the term "troll" is used on the internet in four different ways:

1) The gratuitous troll, who doesn't actually hate anyone but who simply gets his thrills from saying things that will upset people. We have a few examples of that here, though not too many. On TBBS, these people are pretty much all banned. These clearly deserve to be called trolls.

2) The reactionary troll, who seeks to be as insulting as possible in reaction to what he perceives as trolling from others. We have a lot of those here, and there are quite a few on TBBS as well. In my opinion, these also deserve to be called trolls.

3) The hateful troll, who isn't deliberately trying to upset people, but who posts his opinions in aggressive terms, making fun of those who disagree with him, using coarse and sometimes deliberately insulting language. There again, we have quite a few of them, as does TBBS. I am not sure the term "troll" is appropriate here, but the behavior certainly is not polite. The problem with calling such people trolls is it leads to confusion with those who deliberately want to annoy others (whether gratuitously or in reaction to the insults of others), but there nevertheless needs to be some term for such people, who are annoying even though they don't do it specifically in order to offend others.

4) The positional troll, who is labelled a troll simply for holding to hateful positions. I have long argued that such people are not trolls, but merely people with hateful opinions, but pretty much to no avail. Many people cannot imagine that some people actually have hateful opinions, so they suppose that anyone who expresses them is doing so deliberately to annoy others. But I am convinced that a lot of hateful opinions that I have seen expressed (racism, homophobia, calling unborn children "parasites", saying that all people who believe in God are mentally deranged...) really are the honest opinions of those expressing them.

Some people simply cannot disagree with someone without hating them, so for them there is no difference between (for example) "I think you are wrong for believing in God" and "I think you are an inferior person for believing in God," or "I do not think homosexuality is normal behavior" and "I think homosexuals are inferior people." In each of those examples, the former is a valid (though not necessarily correct) opinion and the second is a hateful opinion, because it goes beyond evaluation of behavior to a value judgment of the person. Positional trolls are called trolls because people are incapable of making that distinction (the classic example here was Shep, who was always extremely careful never to say anything that indicated hate for anyone, but who was constantly accused of hating others because he disagreed with certain behavior--most people were not able to understand the difference). Positional trolls are not trolls; they are simply people with opinions that (to us, from our own subjective and quite possibly wrong perspective) are hateful.

The conclusion, Apostle, is that whether or not others think you are a troll and/or call you a troll is not important. What is important is whether or not you actually are. Where do you fit in on that scale? We all fit into it somewhere; every one of us has opinions that are "hateful" to others. There is no shame in that. But if you rise higher on the scale than the fourth level, then there is a problem that ought to be dealt with. Whether it is appropriate to call that problem "trolling" or not is not really important.

Self-centered much?

Thanks.

In real life they're usually called "assholes".