Troll Threshold

POSTED BY: AnthonyT
UPDATED: Thursday, October 2, 2025 14:14
VIEWED: 10983
PAGE 7 of 13

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And I think very few here are trolls - people intentionally, maliciously baiting and derailing - but there are a few.

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Rue- let me be blunt: Yeah, and so what?

Trolls go out of their way to provoke people. Responding to their posts with anger puts you in danger of being controlled by them. For the vast remainder who are sincere but who may seem deliberately provocative, responding in anger simply makes them defensive. In other words, frustration and anger don't work no matter WHO you're posting to.

Yes (sigh) I KNOW there are trolls on this board. So do a whole bunch of people. Why do you keep bringing it up? Just make sure that in your frustration you don't become one of them. Or if you do, be more effective about it.

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Reality sucks. Especially when it contradicts our cherished ideas.

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Well, there's argument and there's retaliation-in-kind of the sort I object to. Take, for instance, your labeling me as one of the "assholes." Retaliation in kind would be to respond to that by applying some sort of insulting label to you, which I have not done. When I think you're wrong, I'll call you out on it; but that's not the sort of thing that I was thinking of above.

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Grand High Poobah of the Mythical Land of Iowa, and Keeper of State Secrets

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Causal,

I was attacked for no reason.

When you were invited to look back and state what I had posted that deserved it, you couldn't come up with anything valid. What you eventually posted after being repeatedly asked by others (and which was really, incredibly, shamefully stupid) was that if I didn't like the thread I didn't have to post. Really? Only people who agree with everything in a thread need apply? Only people who agree with everything you support on a thread need post? Or is that a special standard only for me?

You went so far as to encourage, applaud and participate in that ongoing undeserved attack on me. All the while berating ME for replying in kind.

If you think it's a problem, mebee a look in the mirror is in order.

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Originally posted by citizen:
I do wonder though if that is what the contention is, not merely that Liberals are in the majority here, but that because this board is mostly of American stock many of the conservatives simply cannot handle not being in the majority as they are IRL.

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I've been starting to wonder about that my own self. Hundreds of millions of dollars has been spent over the past three decades in the United States in an attempt to make the word liberal a slur. And, for the most part, it has been successful. I have friends in red parts of the country that keep very very quiet about their liberal beliefs.

I guess it's sorta similar to being an atheist. The vast majority of Americans consider themselves Christian. That is the cultural norm in this country. Atheists are zero threat to Christians. But they consistently poll at the bottom in terms of trustworthiness. And it goes beyond that. Some Christians seem to loathe atheists with the same fervor usually reserved for mass murderers.

Sometimes, when you're a member of the dominant culture, any viewpoint from a member of a minority culture can seem threatening. Or just wrong. You know that's not the way the world works. The world works the way it works for your group. I've seen valid criticisms dismissed out of hand by people who have never been in the position of a minority. They just can't grok.

But to get back to the negative product branding that has been done on the word liberal. One of my goals, on this site, is to put a human behind the slur. So you think that liberals are traitors and deserve to be shot? Then you think I'm a traitor and that I deserve to be shot. So you think liberals love Osama bin Laden and want millions of Americans to die. Then you think I love Osama bin Laden and want millions of Americans to die. Both statements are absurdly wrong. But easy to believe and utter in the abstract. Just listen to talk radio for a while. And it's especially easy if you don't think you know any liberals. Well, you know them.

I could go on further about my suspicions regarding enforced homogeniety of towns and suburbs wrt race and how that seriously stunts the development of many Americans. But that got little traction before...

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Sorry Soup, but this little voice is going through my head in an imagined self-conversation -

Well, I have nothing personal against liberals. Even some of my best friends are liberals. And besides, you might be a liberal but you're not like those other liberals. You're a regular person just like me. I'm sure, push come to shove, we'd agree on the same things. So we can get along fine and be friends.

End result, it's possible for people to get along with you just fine and still rant about 'liberals'.

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Yeah, Rue, you're probably right. And if wishes were horses we'd all be eating steak. But a boy can dream .

Off on a tangent...

I just got done reading a book that I found profoundly unsettling (Sundown Towns by James Loewen). I highly recommend it. And I wish that he had the years left to continue on with this research because, as he acknowledges, this is very early stages. Unfortunately, he's a professor emeritus so he probably won't be around much longer.

It just boggles the mind that sundown towns and suburbs reached their peak in 1968. And that some of the towns that drove out their black population after 1890 (or suburbs that were created all white) are still all white to this day. That narrowing of experience that results from forced similarity in neighbors has been trained into generations of Americans.

"Living in a place where not everyone looks alike and not everyone votes alike is surely good for the mind as well as the children."

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Originally posted by SoupCatcher:

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Originally posted by citizen:
I do wonder though if that is what the contention is, not merely that Liberals are in the majority here, but that because this board is mostly of American stock many of the conservatives simply cannot handle not being in the majority as they are IRL.

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I've been starting to wonder about that my own self. Hundreds of millions of dollars has been spent over the past three decades in the United States in an attempt to make the word liberal a slur. And, for the most part, it has been successful. I have friends in red parts of the country that keep very very quiet about their liberal beliefs.

I guess it's sorta similar to being an atheist. The vast majority of Americans consider themselves Christian. That is the cultural norm in this country. Atheists are zero threat to Christians. But they consistently poll at the bottom in terms of trustworthiness. And it goes beyond that. Some Christians seem to loathe atheists with the same fervor usually reserved for mass murderers.

Sometimes, when you're a member of the dominant culture, any viewpoint from a member of a minority culture can seem threatening. Or just wrong. You know that's not the way the world works. The world works the way it works for your group. I've seen valid criticisms dismissed out of hand by people who have never been in the position of a minority. They just can't grok.

But to get back to the negative product branding that has been done on the word liberal. One of my goals, on this site, is to put a human behind the slur. So you think that liberals are traitors and deserve to be shot? Then you think I'm a traitor and that I deserve to be shot. So you think liberals love Osama bin Laden and want millions of Americans to die. Then you think I love Osama bin Laden and want millions of Americans to die. Both statements are absurdly wrong. But easy to believe and utter in the abstract. Just listen to talk radio for a while. And it's especially easy if you don't think you know any liberals. Well, you know them.

I could go on further about my suspicions regarding enforced homogeniety of towns and suburbs wrt race and how that seriously stunts the development of many Americans. But that got little traction before...

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Enjoyed the post; I think it's a good project to put some humanity behind the word liberal. I hope that the opposite works, too, of course. Because the reverse also happens: all social conservatives are evil morons, therefore I'm an evil moron. Well, come now, can it really be that easy? The kind of thing you describe really works both ways. You said how some atheists feel persecuted when the majority is theist--well on this board republicans, conservatives and Christians sometimes feel persecuted because they are in the minority. Maybe your project of humanization can be pushed out to everybody such that we all see each other primarily as people, and only then liberals, conservatives, or what have you.

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Grand High Poobah of the Mythical Land of Iowa, and Keeper of State Secrets

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Originally posted by citizen:
Strangely enough I've never had this problem when debating politics with anyone but Americans, I've gone over all the same things with British (even Australian and Canadian, but never French) conservatives, half the people I drink with and most of the people I work with are conservative, without problem. Although I'm sure that's just proof that I hate Americans or something I find it's much harder to discuss things with Americans sometimes because things have to be polarised (you're liberal, I'm conservative we have to disagree on everything) and it so often has to be about whose saying what rather than what is being said. I find American approach to politics to be somewhat different to British, more about the cult of personality rather than anything approaching issues.

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Well, yeah, I guess I can't help but speak from an American perspective (being one myself). My apologies, but I don't keep track of other country's political systems as closely as maybe I should. I think that you're right about the polarization of American politics. We can't come together and discuss things calmly anymore, because we've divided all the issues and taken opposing positions. Both sides think that the other is not just wrong, but bad for the country, and so there's no need to talk with them. But that's just wrong, and downright disturbing. BTW, I don't think you hate Americans. More like you're frustrated with us over this (and other) issues. But you can still be civil (mostly; but who among us doesn't have their moments, eh?).

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What's most frustrating is that so often you can predict someone's opinions based on whether they vote Democrat or Republican (actually what is most frustrating is how a country like the US with such a huge right wing slant to both it's politics and media has so many talking about the liberal bias of the media which is simply not there). I do wonder though if that is what the contention is, not merely that Liberals are in the majority here, but that because this board is mostly of American stock many of the conservatives simply cannot handle not being in the majority as they are IRL.

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Funny thing about that: the way one perceives the "slant" to the media tends to go opposite to one's own political views. I started out on the right and thought that the slant was left. Then I swung over to the left and thought that the slant was to the right. Then I wound up fairly close to the middle and have realized that if there's a slant it's more a person-by-person thing (and maybe channel by channel) than it is the whole media. I guess my point is that both sides make the argument that the media is slanted against them, and I think they're both wrong, on the whole. The media reports what sells, and that varies tremendously from place to place.

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It's certainly true that this board is mostly full of thick skinned posters that attack each other, I'm certainly aware that I am not blameless there. I'm also aware that in many posters those quickest to talk about how 'everyone is attacking them' are the first to attack, I'm also aware that I post on other boards with little or no problem, so find the many accusations that it is 'all down to me' to be somewhat baseless.

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Well, back to the issue of dividing ourselves. There're a fair number of people who, once you're on their shit-list, will disagree with you on anything you say, merely because you had some run-in with them in the past or because they disagree with you socially or politically. These seem to be the people who muddy the waters of discussion, because rather than talk about this issues calmly, they go on the offensive with ad hominem attacks and accusations. So the people who want to actually discuss the issues get drowned out and ultimately just leave the discussion. Happens all the time.

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I'd also like to point out that there are a number of Trolls who frequent this board, and that they have chosen a right wing persona

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