What does a troll really want?

[_honorentheos]

EDIT: Decided to message EA with the question to avoid a Beetlejuice moment.

[_EAllusion]

As a moderator, I have a few quick thoughts that I'll share here rather than in the moderator forum.

I haven't followed GD discussion well enough to know the recent history of MG's posting and others reaction to it. I've read reported posts, people's complaints, and quotes that people have used to make their argument. I also did a survey of MG's posting recently to get a sense of the content.

I'm persuaded that MG is deliberately entering threads on a consistent basis in order to be disruptive to them. He's not trying to participate in conversation in these instances. He's trying to blow it up by pushing people's buttons. He seems to have historical and current "triggers" that he thinks justifies doing this.

Personally, I think trolling generally should be reacted to simply by ignoring it. Looking at how grinadel responded, over and over all I could think is, "Don't reply dude. It's obvious what he is doing." Grinadel took the bait so many times in my reading that I put some fault on him for not having the insight to just not reply. This is true of a few other posters as well. There's also a lot of retaliation involving rule violation as well.

I tend to favor a light touch with trolling. In this off-topic forum, Bach is a deliberate troll who routinely posts attack threads. I leave them alone. The fact that I am a frequent subject of attack probably causes me to have a lighter touch to avoid the appearance of bias, but I usually leave this alone regardless. Any action we took with MG would have to be applied to posters like him as well. There is a blurry line between trolling to derail and just saying stupidly reasoned things that a crowd doesn't like to hear that can be difficult to navigate.

That said, I would be reluctantly in favor of queueing MG because I think his derail attempts border on spam and he's having to be moderated for this too often. I strongly favor queuing posters who spam or who habitually need to be moderated because of not following moderator guidelines. I would want this to be probationary and would favor allowing him off the queue provided he sticks to avoiding the target behaviors for a month or so. Part of my hesitation is that I absolutely do not favor moderating anyone simply because another poster, no matter how well liked, threatens to quit if we do not do so. It sends the wrong message and can lead to mob impingement on free expression.

Regarding Jersey Girl's argument that if we could be compassionate to Darrick, then we can be compassionate to Grinadel, the key difference in that analogy is the "compassion" being referred to was not banning Darrick up to a certain point while she is advocating banning/censoring someone else on Grinadel's behalf because he doesn't like them. It's just not a comparable situation and the argument doesn't hold water.

[_Some Schmo]

Started reading this thread thinking it would be an abstract exercise.

I did too. Lemmie came up with some awesome click bait, but I'm disappointed it's about a particular case.

MG is a troll now? Wow, I've been away from the LDS stuff for a while.

[Guest]

Started reading this thread thinking it would be an abstract exercise.

I did too. Lemmie came up with some awesome click bait, but I'm disappointed it's about a particular case....

Sorry to disappoint you, my friend. I'll see what I can do to come up with a companion thread that is pure theory. In the abstract, I am as disappointed by anecdotal evidence as you are.

[_Lemmie]

Thanks for weighing in, EA, your calm and measured approach to the situation is much appreciated.

I'm persuaded that MG is deliberately entering threads on a consistent basis in order to be disruptive to them. He's not trying to participate in conversation in these instances. He's trying to blow it up by pushing people's buttons. He seems to have historical and current "triggers" that he thinks justifies doing this.

That seems to sum up very succinctly the recent situation.

I would be reluctantly in favor of queueing MG because I think his derail attempts border on spam and he's having to be moderated for this too often. I strongly favor queuing posters who spam or who habitually need to be moderated because of not following moderator guidelines. I would want this to be probationary and would favor allowing him off the queue provided he sticks to avoiding the target behaviors for a month or so.

That sounds like a great approach. What would we need to do to request formally that this action be taken?

[_Jersey Girl]

Regarding Jersey Girl's argument that if we could be compassionate to Darrick, then we can be compassionate to Grinadel, the key difference in that analogy is the "compassion" being referred to was not banning Darrick up to a certain point while she is advocating banning/censoring someone else on Grinadel's behalf because he doesn't like them. It's just not a comparable situation and the argument doesn't hold water.

The compassion being referred to was stated in my post. I'll underline it for you.

This board has engaged in many acts of compassion over the years. MDB even passed the hat on behalf of Darrick. I was banned at the time, but I did view the call for assistance and responses. Here's my deal, Darrick wasn't even an authentic contributor to this forum, the only thing he really contributed was the spectacle and chaos.

If this community can act on compassion towards a Darrick, I think it should be willing to act on compassion for grindael who contributes so much to not only his own journey, but the journey of others. I think this community can show compassion to grindael by giving serious and thoughtful consideration to what has taken place.

What I am saying is that if this board can act on compassion towards someone who was banned from here, like Darrick, then we can act on compassion towards a current member.

[_Jersey Girl]

EA there was a thread in Terrestrial about a news article concerning Darrick. Even though he'd been banned, folks here tried to help him. That's the act of compassion I was talking about there.

[_EAllusion]

EA there was a thread in Terrestrial about a news article concerning Darrick. Even though he'd been banned, folks here tried to help him. That's the act of compassion I was talking about there.

I misread that. I recall that as well. That's clearly quite different than being "compassionate" by affecting another person's posting privileges because grinadel has had problems with him. Either that's the correct thing to do or not on the merits, not because the community was nice to Darrick at some point.

[_EAllusion]

That sounds like a great approach. What would we need to do to request formally that this action be taken?

People clearly already have. I'll ask Shades his thoughts in private.

[_Lemmie]

That sounds like a great approach. What would we need to do to request formally that this action be taken?

People clearly already have. I'll ask Shades his thoughts in private.

Thank you.