Forum Post: Troll patrol
Posted 12 years ago on Oct. 13, 2011, 4:56 p.m. EST by momshieb
(11)
This content is user submitted and not an official statement
A gentle suggestion from a middle aged teacher: When the trolls post with profanity and hate, don't respond. They won't keep visiting if they are met with silence. It works in fifth grade, it should work with this group. :-) Meanwhile, please be peaceful in the morning! Motherly love coming your way.
I've mostly just hit the little down arrow next to their names. Sends them to the bottom where they belong. Right with their ethics.
Bravo. Just put 'em on ignore.
You are probably right. But man, HowardRoark is a piece of work.
well-understanding...
momshieb,
How would you respond if I said that the protesters, indeed the members of this very website, were collectively posting more profanity and hate than (well) anybody?
I would tell them to ignore the provocation. That was the point of my original post. I would urge people to simply ignore those comments which add nothing to the discussion, and simply attempt to engage people in reciprocal name calling and who can swear more profusely than whom. Which is why it reminds me of fifth grade.
It's a little bit hard to ignore the provocation when the protesters join hands and march towards the cops. Sorry.
I think the issue of trolling is that they add no real substance to the conversation and instead post with attention grabbing name calling.
Like the people who keep posting stuff like "Hippies! You'll never win! The rich will CRUSH you! Hahaha!" without even telling us how and why they will crush us and how to stop it.
I agree. as long as we are bumping hateful threads, we give the first visitor the impression that the trolls are running this forum.
With respect, gawd, how does it help anything to respond with matching fuck yous? Makes it all sound far more trivial than it actually is. Looking back over the past week, the tone and content of these threads has declined in direct proportion to the number of hateful posts from "the other side."
Just ignore and talk about the important points!
er. this is not really that useful. its a nice theory, but you don't really understand apparently the difference between child and adult trolls.
And everybody's definition of "troll" is relative.
Personal insults about one's worth as a human being seem pretty trolly, regardless of the content of the debate.
Yes, persistent ad-hominem attacks are a troll red card. Happens to the best of us sometimes though.
not really, there are objective criteria to determine what and who is a troll.
OK, instead of using the very negative "troll", let's just say: those who are using profanity, name calling, and pointless ranting. Call them what you will, we all know them. Bizinuez, I like your approach, too. Just hate to see so much energy wasted. Maybe because I'm getting older, and my energy reserves are limited! But it just seems to be so off the message.
Disagree. "Pointless ranting" is going to be a matter of opinion -- any rant you disagree with will be "pointless," otherwise it will have a "point." Use of profanity is also not trolling, unless the commenter is doing nothing but posting profanity. Of course, you are free to ignore anything you want to ignore.
Name calling is not necessarily trolling, but I agree that it's best not to engage in it and to encourage others not to. Ignoring it is a good way to do that.
Trolling is going to a website and putting up comments just to get reactions out of people. I agree that the best way to deal with this behavior is to ignore it, however.
Thanks, del, you are right. I don't want this group to get into any type of censorship, just advising that when a post is so obviously simply provocative (look for the "hahahahah"), then it is best to simply not engage. This movement is at a critical point, a pivotal moment. We have gained just enough attention to be under attack; this type of distraction simply has no merit and can only hurt the focus and the forward momentum of the group.
Well said.