What is 'trolling'?

[Dick Whitman]

Been thinking a lot about the T-bomb lately. It gets tossed around here quite a bit, though I think the 20-80 rule applies, i.e. 20 percent of posters drop about 80 percent of the T-bomb references.

I've been accused of being a "troll" here when I feel like I'm just using dry wit or needling someone in a good-natured way. I saw a reference to "trolls" yesterday in a Tweet about an Eddie Lacy feature. To me, making fun of someone's weight isn't being a "troll." It's just being a deck.

To me, it's very specific: Someone on the Internet who makes an argument they don't really believe in, or invent an anecdote that they know isn't true (often about a racial minority), just to watch people react is "trolling."

 

[Songbird]

It's a stupid forking term bandied about by people with gorgonzola for brains.

 

[TheSportsPredictor]

Defense lawyers would be the biggest trolls of all based on making an argument they don't believe in.

 

[Elliotte Friedman]

Probably this thread

 

[Dick Whitman]

Defense lawyers would be the biggest trolls of all based on making an argument they don't believe in.

I'm not a defense lawyer.

Nice try, though.

 

[Elliotte Friedman]

You guys lecture us all the time about how we're supposed to treat you with respect. You guys lock threads over it. You sticky threads.

And then you act like a deck toward us.

How do expect people to feel?

If you have a problem with me, I'd be happy to continue it over PM. But your post was uncalled for.

Uh, I was joking. I laughed when I saw it. If I really had a problem, I'd have locked or deleted something.

 

[TyWebb]

You guys lecture us all the time about how we're supposed to treat you with respect. You guys lock threads over it. You sticky threads.

And then you act like a deck toward us.

How do expect people to feel?

If you have a problem with me, I'd be happy to continue it over PM. But your post was uncalled for.

Couldn't he have been needling you in a good-natured way?

 

[Dick Whitman]

Couldn't he have been needling you in a good-natured way?

Probably. I know he doesn't think highly of me. I deleted the post, though. I'll take him at his word.

 

[TyWebb]

Probably. I know he doesn't think highly of me. I deleted the post, though. I'll take him at his word.

My two cents: This is where you often earn, at least partially, the T badge. While it is good-natured on your end, it isn't always easy to tell on a message board post, as seen above. And when the good-natured part of your needling is gone, even if it is only in perception, all that is left is needling. And I don't think it is a big jump from needling to trolling. Both are used to get a response from the recipient for the enjoyment of the needler/troll.

Also, who the fork cares if some anonymous avatar on a silly message board calls you a troll? You take that shirt way too seriously.

 

[Dick Whitman]

My two cents: This is where you often earn, at least partially, the T badge. While it is good-natured on your end, it isn't always easy to tell on a message board post, as seen above. And when the good-natured part of your needling is gone, even if it is only in perception, all that is left is needling. And I don't think it is a big jump from needling to trolling. Both are used to get a response from the recipient for the enjoyment of the needler/troll.

Also, who the fork cares of some anonymous avatar on a silly message board calls you a troll? You take that shirt way too seriously.

I'm actually 99 percent OK with it, with one particular poster being the big exception.

 

[Dick Whitman]

My two cents: This is where you often earn, at least partially, the T badge. While it is good-natured on your end, it isn't always easy to tell on a message board post, as seen above. And when the good-natured part of your needling is gone, even if it is only in perception, all that is left is needling. And I don't think it is a big jump from needling to trolling. Both are used to get a response from the recipient for the enjoyment of the needler/troll.

Also, who the fork cares if some anonymous avatar on a silly message board calls you a troll? You take that shirt way too seriously.

I guess in my day we called it "being a smartass."

One of the problems is that by nature I'm a pretty sincere/earnest guy who has forced myself over the years to take myself and life less seriously. And so when I'm called a "troll," it doesn't at all match my self-image or intent.

A few years ago, a friend of mine got charged with conversion for a really honest fork-up. He's a coach, so it was in the newspapers, etc. And I remember him telling me that more than anything else, he just wanted to scream to the world, "I AM NOT WHAT YOU THINK I AM!!!"

And that's kind of how I feel.

 

[Songbird]

What is conversion?