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Why this blog?
Until this moment I have been forced to listen while media and politicians alike have told me "what Canadians think". In all that time they never once asked.
This is just the voice of an ordinary Canadian yelling back at the radio -
"You don't speak for me."
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What exactly is a troll anyway? Is it anyone who does play stupid and conforms and obeys the preferred narrative?
Some of them work for news media and some have government jobs. Seems like only yesterday we spent literally minutes checking and back tracking user location data to find so many.
Yeah BC … and usually illiterate … like you.
I’d like to buy a vowel.
Time was when if someone had a ‘bounty’ on them they were the ‘bad guy’ and the ‘bounty hunters’ were the good guys with correct morals who were hunting outside of the reasonably limited jurisdiction of localized law enforcement to bring these ‘wanted men/women’ to trial.
Just for mention: most ‘Wanted Men/Women’ could show up for trial or procedure without having a ‘bounty’ placed on them.
Do we want to argue morals? And from whose perspective? Someone who champions bail jumpers?
Your biting commentary is all gum and no teeth and your attempt to frame me as being with the media or government is equally lame.
Now, back to my original comment, why is it that anyone who disturbs the preferred narrative become a “troll”? It’s an honest question.
I wouldn’t say that “troll” means someone who merely “disturbs the preferred narrative,” though I suppose some of them think that’s what they are.
Usually internet trolls are either people who are rude and antagonistic just for the fun of it, or because they are so obsessive about their ideology that they think any sort of attack on opponents is justified, even (or maybe especially) when their comments have nothing to do with the issue at hand.
For example, all the “feminist” guys who spew things like “I hope you get raped you ugly cow” (or the other C word) to conservative women speaking out about abortion or debunking feminist claims about the supposed pay gap etc., which is pretty common, especially on Twitter.
Or in less political realms, an acquaintance of mine was recently proudly displaying screen caps of him saying awful things on a certain band’s Facebook page and getting into verbal fights with that band’s fans after the band got fired from a tour. My acquaintance spent his entire Saturday doing this, apparently he thinks he’s justified because 1. he hates their music, and 2. he heard a rumor that the signer is kind of a pig with groupies so it’s an opportunity to feel all holier-than-thou.
Those are the sorts of things I usually hear being described as troll behaviour.
“You CONservatives are all the same!” Is that disturbing the preferred narrative or trolling? C’mon, you know what a troll is.
Troll: old Cree word for “big bed-wetter who pretends he’s not”.
I always thought troll had its basis in fishing. Someone who throws out a tasty looking hook and drags it in front of the group in an effort to break up the discussion and lead one (or more) members of the discussion off in a new and ultimately bad direction.
Bridge trolls are the other possibility that come to mind, not allowing any to pass and continue with the discussion unless a toll is paid.
Barbed comments and barbed hooks make me think it’s the former that was the origin, but the imagery of the second lends itself to caricature. Not to mention that fisherman are far smarter than fish, but most internet trolls I’ve encountered shouldn’t be trusted near sharp objects.
If you want to learn about the nature of Trolls … Norse Literature and mythology is the ticket. Even a simple children’s like “The Three Billy Goats Gruff” illustrates the nature of the beast.
http://www.princeton.edu/~achaney/tmve/wiki100k/docs/Troll.html
However, in the sense of modern internet we have serial abusers who make it their purpose to “troll” (like in fishing) from site to site for the sole purpose of interjecting and disrupting the narrative of others. IN short PESTS.
One would think that after the years of being the object of attention for a series of social rejects and mental defectives who spent so much energy on THIS blog that there would be little or no doubt about “What is a troll”.
BTW Sajak’s observation about the actual dwelling habits of these losers is bang on.
“…Is it anyone who does play stupid and conforms and obeys the preferred narrative?…”
Nope….that’s a Liberal.
Trolls are ignorant, ill-informed and not very bright, but have laughable smug impotent-nerd pretensions to intellectual superiority.
Trolls always hang out where they’re not wanted and gainsay anything they don’t agree with – repeatedly ad nauseam.
Trolls invariably resort to childish teasing and condescension even when they have no counter-argument to present.
Trolls persist in threads trying to get the last word in even after a thread has died – they are first and foremost pathological attention hogs, even when the attention is wholly negative.
That answer your question Blame Crash? You started from a false argument (that trolls merely “disrupt the preferred narrative”), but hopefully I’ve cleared that up. You’re welcome.