Nasty little things called Trolls

Several years ago I was an admin for an online discussion board for parents. There were a variety of users, such as pregnant moms restricted to bed rest with only a laptop as a social life line, women who were having little to no success in trying to conceive a child, and parents of children with special needs and/or illnesses. To be sure, if you have ever been in any of these women’s shoes, you would recognize the value of such an online community in providing such a priceless resource for information, comfort, and fellowship.

From time to time, I’d have to drop everything and track IP addresses/block user access as someone was trolling. An anonymous user would flame, provoke, or deliberately give false or derogatory information- just to stir the pot. Repulsive, isn’t it? To prey upon some these very real women, with very legitimate concerns, just to get a rise or mock or insult?

It was obvious that some trollers were there simply to promote their own egos. Someone wasn’t getting enough love in their off-line lives. However, some trollers seemed to 'live to hate' by infiltrating, acting as “one of us”, and then bringing out the dagger through character assassination, rumors, and double-speak. I’m sure Satan himself is flattered with the imitation.

Wikipedia’s definition of Troll, quoting an excerpt from Judith Donath:

Trolling is a game about identity deception, albeit one that is played without the consent of most of the players. The troll attempts to pass as a legitimate participant, sharing the group's common interests and concerns; the newsgroups members, if they are cognizant of trolls and other identity deceptions, attempt to both distinguish real from trolling postings, and upon judging a poster a troll, make the offending poster leave the group. Their success at the former depends on how well they — and the troll — understand identity cues; their success at the latter depends on whether the troll's enjoyment is sufficiently diminished or outweighed by the costs imposed by the group.

Trolls can be costly in several ways. A troll can disrupt the discussion on a newsgroup, disseminate bad advice, and damage the feeling of trust in the newsgroup community. Furthermore, in a group that has become sensitized to trolling — where the rate of deception is high — many honestly naïve questions may be quickly rejected as trollings. This can be quite off-putting to the new user who upon venturing a first posting is immediately bombarded with angry accusations. Even if the accusation is unfounded, being branded a troll is quite damaging to one's online reputation.

For those of you with experience using online communities, this explanation is totally on the money.

I ask you, how is trolling online any different than trolling…say…the Tea Party Protests?

Jason Levin, is spearheading the infiltration effort to "act on behalf of the Tea Party in ways which exaggerate their least appealing qualities" and "damage the public's opinion of them."

Is it not repugnant enough (or perhaps deranged/psychotic/pathological) to, not only deliberately disguise one’s self as someone they are not, but to then infiltrate themselves into a legitimate group for the purpose of destruction?  I can almost comprehend the method, if coming from a psychopath.  But this Jason dude is a middle school teacher! (Oregon, home-school your kids NOW!)

It was delightfully gratifying seeing images of Tea Party protestors carrying signs that reveal these creatures for who they are. Signs read “Infiltrator- This person is NOT with us”, and “We’re not with STUPID” (arrow pointing to real live troll).  Ironically, I’m kind of glad these trolls are out there, as they’re doing the self-reporting that the media is not. So....

My utmost gratitude to the “Crash the Tea Party” Troll movement.  Your unintended consequences makes the point much better than I ever could.