Lately there has been some consternation expressed about trolling of various sorts on BMG. Some users here post Fehrnstrom-esque talking points in order to provoke a response; others, known as “concern trolls,” express faux concern about the campaign of a candidate for whom they feign support.
The thing to realize about these folks is that they crave attention. When you respond to them, you are giving them exactly what they want, and that encourages them to keep doing it. So the solution is a simple one: don’t respond. Nothing irritates a troll more than being ignored. If you don’t rise to the bait, the troll will eventually slink back under its bridge, where it belongs. :-)
And just to be clear: thoughtful conservatives are, and always have been, welcome at BMG. They make this site a better and more interesting place. This post is not about them. This post is about the folks who … well, you know exactly who I mean.
Troll image via Shutterstock.
Discuss
25 Comments . Leave a comment below.David is crying b/c I don’t live in Cambridge, instead live in a bellwether community and votes both Rep and Dem. I don’t rely on BMG as my sole news source, but when I read something on the Herald or Globe, will bounce it off you folks and get to the truth, like the BMW question.
If six of you people can’t stand me and want me go, vote yes, and I will email BMG asking them to rescind my name and password. I guess that will be Bob or David, but to be honest, I have no clue. If this is my last post, thanks for the intellectual engagement and the funny jokes.
Capt Kirk and JohnnyCakes votes yes on the other article posted yesterday. Four more neded, SmervilleTom and Demintfan, needed to say yes, nothing else. Otherwise I get it, you can’t quit me…. Ok Four more and so long. I will check back tonite.
that you consider yourself one of the trolls, and not one of the thoughtful conservatives?
Ryan- I have not been called a toll once, or twice, or three times. It is closer to a gazillion times. You know why? Because I ask questions. Some times, my questions point out the serial hypocrisy of some people, and I am then told I am off topic!!!! It reminds me of an old song, I think by Wings, called Man On The Run.
You too, did not vote yes, so thanks for support, so far. Polls still open till Monday night. Thanks Peter as well. I like your idea of a graduated tax rate in investment income, based on how much of a capital gain % you earn.
Ok next post will be Monday night (if I survive this recall, but I like the results so far).
Not because I’ve paid much attention to anything you’ve written, but because the name of the song is “Band on the Run”. It was probably the biggest hit that band Wings had. Don’t know how the song applies to your situation, but I don’t think you do either. Hence, I add my vote to the tally.
You’ve shown no evidence of a political philosophy, or prominent issues. I find it worthwhile to explore worldviews other than mine, and see how others apply them to the political issues. I’ve never come class to that reading your stuff.
No, from you it’s a march of replicated press statements in a wheedling tone. You don’t offer anything I can’t get by scanning FoxNews for ten minutes. I vote that the space you occupy in this blog be better used.
No. You get called a troll because you ask stupid questions, and your motive in doing so is to stir shit, not to express a viewpoint or to enlighten. In other words, because you are a troll.
So yes, I think you should go somewhere else to stir shit.
You are a troll, you know you’re a troll, you’ve basically admitted you’re a troll.
No one’s perfect, god knows I’ve had my share of bad posts, but you continually demonstrate a lack of willingness to constructively engage with the community and can be by no appearances here for any other reason than causing grief and trying to stir people up.
So, yes, I am an enthusiastic vote for your own self-ban, at least until you study the resident conservatives who actually demonstrate that they’re here for honest reasons and aren’t just here trying to make our collective heads explode.
I will add this clarification: my post did not single out any particular BMGer. But, of course, if you think you’re a troll, then you probably are.
is admitting you have a problem.
You were the one who responded to Demeter11 who did, by name, call me a troll. By your answer to him, did you or did you not imply that you agreed with him? Seeing you did not vote yes to get rid of me, this does suggest you are comfortable in your beliefs and do not mind being challenged from another point of view, unlike some on this board (hello Kirk and Johnny).
The vote will remain open until Monday night, I don’t want to be accused of voter suppression, being a holiday weekend. But thanks for standing up to the bullies, and not voting yes.
YES
… or add some method of either re-enforcing a good post or declaring disagreement with a bad one, that doesn’t require actually responding.
In the absence of rating systems the signal to noise ratio is unacceptable: either too much noise in cacophonous response or relative silence which taken to be complicity and/or agreement.
I never really paid to much never-mind to the ratings system when we had it, and so I thought it superflous. I no longer think that. I think it was, at the least, a quiet method of identifying trolls and giving feedback. Perhaps not perfect but certainly better than the spittle and venom that gets traded back and forth at times.
You can vote to either recommend a comment or suggest it should be hidden – if it gets enough hide rates, it disappears into the “hidden comments” section. Comments that the community disagrees with go away, and commenters who get frequently hidden are eventually auto-banned. It may work better there than it would here, due to the volume of users over there, but it is a good system.
Let ignorance, and its public admonition through ratings, stand visible to all as an example of how much weight one is actually assessed by the community.
Hiding comments trims from the discussion a lot of heated and uninformative exchanges. The genealogical musings of our coyness opponent, for example, crowd out discussions that could be insightful and surprising with exchanges that are predictable, circular, and dull.
…I’m torn because you are absolutely right that these tangents get inane. Down-rating while not responding with comments allows for registering the admonition of the community. Without down-rating, response is more likely. It’s these responses that constitute the bulk of inane tangents and eliminating their need might very well mitigate the issue enough. At least it seemed to back when we had the ratings system. Not always in every case, but enough that it worked reasonably well in general.
was that the ratings themselves were anonymous, which meant they were horribly abused.
AFAIK, there isn’t an easily available wordpress method of creating a ratings system similar to the soapblox one we had, which was pretty decent, and certainly not one that’s like dkos, which is near perfect.
So, unfortunately, I doubt we’ll be seeing something for a while… unless BMG gets a sudden influx of new resources soon :p
I don’t know, but if you want to trapezoid you need plenty of zoid food.
The observant reader will note how the-commentator-I-shall-not-mention appears to relish the truckloads of disapproval heaped upon him here. Our transcaucasian commentator savors disapproval as a sign of liberal close-mindedness. Disapproval doesn’t stop these guys from commenting. It encourages them.
If you want them to stop, you should express disapproval at those who respond to them because those people actually respond to disapproval in the expected manner.
Exactly so. Trolls feed on attention, not on approval.
“appears to relish the truckloads of…”
Oh, so it’s the relish.
to be easily digestible.
exist on both sides of most issues…
I enjoying baiting the wingnuts of the Eagle “Obama is a man-child” Tribune site. I freely admit trolling for wingnuttish freak outs.
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