Cra.p Merchants

1. no 2. yes. I'm not too good at starting threads. 3. ages ago. used to get involved in heated debates. decided it was a pointless waste of time since most involved only self-listen to themselves (spot the unwanted word) 4. my offline life and internet life rarely intertwine. so, no. the only 'taler' i have spoken to offline in the last 12 months is pesky, once, and we mainly talked about the eurovision song contest. how about you spider? do you talk to many 'talers offline? hmm?

1. No 2. No 3. Last week Taboo's in humour? 4.Never don't know any talers, don't know anybody who would be interested offline.

1)Have more than 5 out of your last 10 posts been anonymous? no - about 1 in 40 are anon but are recognisable anyway by punctuation errors 2) Are your posts mainly reactive? they are interactive 3) When was the last time you ventured a real heartfelt opinion or even a self-challenging one? I try not to overdo it. I think you can go off at a tangent and it's better to put the heartfelt stuff etc, into your own writing. I believe you can illustrate a point better that way. 4) Do you delight and share in your 'trolling victories' with others offline? That would be a tragic waste of offline trolling time.

"I agree that Greco's anti Trolling campaign was trolling of the worst kind..." I define trolling as upsetting people under a pseudonym. Trolling is not a synonym for troublemaking. Even so, it wasn't troublemaking "of the worst kind". That's going a bit far, I think.

You think? What with?

Not condescending Gerry, but definitely intolerant and misunderstanding of at least some of them. Your attitude is reminiscent of those that oppose secret ballots. You wish to deny the right of expression unless you have the expressionee in the dock. It CAN be a low form of behaviour, but then so can open comment. It can also be hilarious as in a recent thread. I think you need to develop your sense of humour a little more mate. The author of an opinion doesn't necessarily need to be identifiable to have an opinion worth listening to, and some people would never voice one at all if they had to be in the glare of more confident, nay, more opinionated and aggressive opponents. I openly admit I have done my share of trolling and will continue to do so, as and when I think the situation either calls for it or may benefit from it. I have also been the target of much trolling, but I would never advocate that their right to troll be curtailed. Sometimes the trolling is nasty, vicious and vindictive even, sometimes hilariously funny but that's the way life is, you can't pick and choose which bits you want. You say these people should be ignored, well that's fine, do it. Actually I was castigated recently for ignoring somebody in a slightly different arena and circumstance. I was not surprised to be slagged for it even though it was my right and the subject of the ignoring was never publicly castigated for lying about the circunstances. It was *I*, the one in the right that was slagged by the baying mob. (Wankers to a man)

I never use the word Troll because I'm still not too sure what it really means. I've seen it described as nothing more than flame-bait intended for no other purpose than to trigger a flame war with those with a hair-trigger on the reply button. Yet on this site the term is used to describe those who insult using a pseudonym.

1leg, are you still hopping mad? Perhaps you should take a lavander and camomile bath with Sue (Doh!) Hinterlect ... I hear she is very good at removing bottles from bums. Is 1leg your real name or are you a troll?

'they have difficulty focussing their constipated outlook in a positive direction and are reduced to sniping at the faeces of others' I rather like this. Is it another Rene Descartes quote?

Yes.. I do have a general problem with humour these days... I disagree with your opening comment.. I think its the invidious nature of trolling that prevents freedom of speech here in that it works to limit the voicing of challenging, interesting and sometimes even crackpot ideas by less confident people... for fear of them being shot down by the trolls. I don't and have never advocated the banning of anonymous posts on these threads... they are valid contributions tho IMO the fact they are anonymous does detract from them a little... It is troll mentality that I am highlighting, however, and as I stated above it need not be anonymous. Whilst we may all be prone to it from time to time it is when it mutates into something persistent and obsessive and collaborative (for they be group cowards) that it needs to be shown for what it is: Pompous cowardly behaviour often indulged in by a person or persons who would not risk offering a controversial, challenging or thought provoking opinion for fear of being thought 'fools'... so they confine themselves to needling others that do.. often failing to differentiate between the person and an expressed opinion. We will never get rid of trolls, however we should discourage them and certainly not give them any satisfaction by lauding their excessive behaviour. We should recognise that they are troubled souls deserving of pity or else we will end up with a forum full of nostalgia, favourite this n thats and 'mock anger' humour..

Are you in danger of becoming a Crap Merchant? Some self-tests you can perform: 1) Have more than 5 out of your last 10 posts been anonymous? 2) Are your posts mainly reactive? 3) When was the last time you ventured a real heartfelt opinion or even a self-challenging one? 4) Do you delight and share in your 'trolling victories' with others offline? Careful... it is a condition that can creep on you without your full awareness.. If you are doing 4 than not only have you made faeces detection an art you are now are now actively trading in it.. Only trying to help of course. Now I am getting off this bandwagon lest I get soiled myself..

Karl, both your definitions are correct. I've had a look at some other writing sites and, believe me, this is amongst the most benign. At least the insults here are limited to the forum. Elsewhere, especially the sites dominated by Americans (no offence to yanks here, you are all very well behaved), the flame wars about the work itself is beyond belief. Those comment boxes are a disgrace. People who have been kicked out simply come back in another guise and start all over again thus proving that ISP blocking does not work. ABC is so tame ... but not slushy either.

I disagree that they are 'troubled souls', although I accept that that is a condition that can afflict anybody, troll or no. You use the word 'obssessive' above, but the most obvious case of obssession I have encountered on these forums concerned the 'anti-troll' campaign mounted by the mis-guided, and monumentally uninformed gamekeeper turned poacher, whose avowed intent here these days is to show what a @!#$ he is (and very successful and accomplished he is too!) I also disagree that most trolls spend their time 'needling' posters of controversial opinions. I should think that a healthy percentage of them make humourous posts, whilst others take the piss out of pomposity and stupidity. A percentage however, do behave as you suggest, it's part of the price we all have to pay for freedom, not just of speech, but FREEDOM.

1. None of MY last ten, or even twenty posts have been 'troll' posts. 2. I don't believe so. 3. I venture heart-felt opinions all the time as you well know. 4. I have indulged in this, yes. Um, I don't think crap-detection is an art-form, neither is it hard to find on these forums, in fact it abounds at times.

On this site substitute 'hair trigger' with 'hair brain'. Now we's gettin sumwere. Well done for spelng pseudonym corectly Carl. Goat 2 the top of D class. One semenster behind larphaminnit.

The answer to the anonymity question is simple - Search Engines. As for this troll's soul - it is not troubled in any way. It's usually pissed, is all. It has to be pissed to even contemplate sharing this low-rent piece of cyberspace with some of the low-brow lowlife that crawls these threads. And I do not mean yourself 1leg or missi here. You know who they are. This site has the most benign trolls in the entire Trollar System. Some of us try to amuse, entertain, and give two fingers to the pompous and pretentious. If we fail, hey, that's showbiz! Take what you want and leave the rest. Ignore us, please.

Showbiz? Is Larph back already?

French Connection UK all trolls, I say. Fcuk 'em. Where do they get off trolling about with their trolling ways in their friggin' trolling trousers? What IS their problem? It makes me so mad I want to puke in a full and free-flowing way. "Harry, yer a lizard." Now, what sort of contribution to a serious and informed debate is that? They don't have the brains of a solicitor between the lot of them. "Nyah nyah nyah," they say. It's not big and it's not clever and it's not pleasing to the eye. Every troll to be painted red, date-stamped and filed under 'T'. That'll keep tabs on the fcukers.

by trolling I assume you mean anonymous posts. But many anonymous posts are quite benign, while some namedposts are the opposite.

George, I agree that Greco's anti Trolling campaign was trolling of the worst kind... something he recognised and regreted later I seemed to detect.. good on him. You are also right that he went on to try and do the very same that he accused others of... ... no wonder I am always suspicious of obsessive campaigners of any sort (invariably they turn out to have the same mindset as their tormentors - they just accidentally happen to inhabit different sides of an argument and that can change rapidly!) I was merely pointing out the mentality of trolling and how we can all be prone to it. Also that it is behaviour not to delight in when we catch ourselves doing it... Why? well primarily at a personal level it can take up too much time and resources and that works to the detriment of our creative output in more positive directions... The good stuff on here does not need any champions.. it is self evident. Whilst it may be tempting to respond... the best way to deal with dross is to let it submerge as quickly as possible to the bottom..

>>... the best way to deal with dross is to let it submerge as quickly as possible to the bottom..<< But then it gets in the way of we yellow submariners

He only regretted that it wasn't sucessful Gerry, that's why he has reverted to type and now behaves like a moron.

Trolling's fairly harmless arsing about in most of its forms, unless it's the work of snide psycho bullies, of course, in which case, down with it I say.

most people are multiple personalities with views that clash...trolling is a healthy way of expressing those internally inconsistent views...I wish i was like George Mississippi and had a clear opinion on most things but i dont...i'm full of contradictions and so are most other people...the only solution is to troll...as Shakespeare might have put it...i'm like an apostrophe riding a semi colon's bicycle, and if you're honest 1leg so are you.

I guess this is where the "agreeing with Missi" phase draws to a close, hopefully not for too long. I have made my views on trolls clear from the start. I just don't see the point. "Some of us try to amuse, entertain, and give two fingers to the pompous and pretentious. If we fail, hey, that's showbiz!" how utterly pretentious is it to think of yourself as the decider of what's right? the keeper of the faith like some kind of cyber Robin Hood? and how utterly cowardly to do it under a false identity. The entry by "Foll de Roll" above is a classic example of what most trolls are really about. It's an attempt at being funny but misses the mark by a country mile (IMO) and the fear of not being successful at being funny makes people hide behind another name. All this talk of policing the threads is just an excuse. There's no harm in Foll de Roll's entry and others may be wetting themselves but it highlights the problem for me. If an opinion/comment (no matter how benign or strong) isn't worth owning then it's not worth sharing. I try and be funny and on many occasions it doesn't get any kind of feedback and goes down like a blowjob at a family reunion but at least I've got the guts to admit it was me.

1) Have more than 5 out of your last 10 posts been anonymous? 2) Are your posts mainly reactive? 3) When was the last time you ventured a real heartfelt opinion or even a self-challenging one? 4) Do you delight and share in your 'trolling victories' with others offline? How does gerry know all this? Could it be that he is a Master Troll himself?

Eh?