Taxonomy of Trolls

Special to L. Neil Smith’s The Libertarian Enterprise

So, yeah, I do realize I’ve been running a little hot lately, and am more likely to get false positives for trolls and react to that sense than before. Part of that is the times we live in. Being in the stupidest timeline, and two years of lockdowns haven’t helped anyone’s temper. Part of it is specific-to-me circumstances, like us trying to get house unpacked and set up. A situation that tries my patience daily, because well…. Look, I do realize I need to cut back on the sheer amount of possessions. Partly because it’s not like I’m hoarding gold and diamonds, okay? I have an unhealthy number of worn sheets and towels with holes, which I’ve trouble getting rid of because “they might come in handy.”

It’s not helped by the current situation, where the back of my mind tells me “but will that be available again?” when I try to get rid of something.

Anyway I’ve got to deal with that to de-stress, and until then I’ll be a little hot on the jump. Indulge me. OTOH I thought what might trigger my troll alarms, just so you know. I’m not saying “never do this” because I’m not going to unduly restrict your speech here. (Though coming in swearing at me and other commenters, when a total unknown, will still get you banned.) Anyway, here “what makes Sarah smell troll and why.”

So, here is what I will call “a taxonomy of trolls.”

THE INADVERTENT TROLL: I realize I can’t demand that you have read the last week of posts or much less all the comments, but seriously–

Coming up with a complete doom scenario particularly one debunked over and over in posts will get the back of my head screaming “troll.”

Coming into an old post and being weirdly aggressive as to why it’s not true and we’re all doooooomed. Gets my head screaming “troll.”

Now this can be inadvertent, and even well-intentioned, or someone in the depths of the black dog and reaching for anything, but seriously? It feels wrong, particularly if you’re new and I don’t know you. This brings us to:

THE DOOM TROLL- comes in screaming doom doom doom, we’re all doomed. Vomits wall of text. Will take no argument, or leaves a drive-by.

As I said, this might be inadvertent. It might be accidental as I said, and heaven knows, we’re all functioning weirdly due to the lockdowns and stupid.

So, if you’re inclined to a doom troll what I have to ask is what I used to ask my sons: what are you expecting to accomplish?

Look, yeah, maybe everything will be doom and gloom and commie-land forever. (If you reality-test, you’ll realize how unlikely this is, both because forever is a very long time, and because frankly commies can’t keep themselves going. And if we hadn’t helped the USSR– Anyway–) BUT at best what going black-pill right now will achieve is throwing the game when not only we could win, but we have reality on our side.

Yeah, I know, people try to doom so they don’t feel “exposed” and to spare themselves pain, but again, the real world effect on others is terrible.

I also have reason to believe — though I can’t be absolutely sure, of course — that some of the doom trolls are paid/subsidized by the left/foreign interests. Because you know if Americans give up or break up, they win.

So, kindly try to limit the amounts of doom. Yes, I do get some of you are very, very depressed and convinced of doom. I get that. Notice I haven’t banned the regulars who feel like that.

BUT if you’re a newby and relentlessly doomy, you might be mistaken for a troll. Heck, you might even be one.

THE ACTUALLY TROLL – comes in and “corrects” a minor point in the post.

Note that I’m not infallible, and these are often written early morning or late night, with me in a state of semi-somnolence. I do make mistakes. And my commenters correct me often, on historical figures, language, or whatever.

However there is a level of “You mention forks in the fifteenth century, and actually in the fifteenth century, the hand whittled forks of Bavaria–” that is a troll, because it diverts discussion to totally unrelated/unproductive point.

It can be particularly annoying if the commenter is wrong or its debatable.

It climbs to troll if it’s a drive by, and an attempt to discredit the whole post on an incidental point.

The grammar/typo trolls fall into this. Notice I don’t include those of you who have way too much fun with my typos, but those that come in saying something like “For a professional writer, you have a lot of typos, so I can’t believe–“

THE NOTICE ME SEMPAI TROLL- These are bizarre, and the one I’m thinking of was the guy who was extremely annoying so I put him on “approve me before I show” watch. He then, without posting here, went around every right-side blog calling himself things like “SarahHoythatesme” for years. I had no clue who he was, and frankly had no idea why he was doing this. Then he left comments here going on about how he was going to sue me or hit me for “blocking” his comments and “not answering me.”

I have no clue how or why he expected me to answer him on blogs where I never comment and rarely read comments, but whatevs.

This is the “Notice me sempai” troll, and that guy was not the only one. There are a few that have got themselves hard-banned by doing things like bringing imaginary arguments they had with me on other blogs or to other blogs (imaginary, because they referred to me, but I wasn’t there/didn’t answer/had no time for that stuff.)

I have absolutely no clue why I’m so important to them, but hey — diddle diddle! — I apparently am. For those that aren’t actually paid, they need to take their meds and get a life. (PAID? Well, day before yesterday my hotmail was under HARD brute-force attack, trying to break into it. No, they didn’t manage. But like internet shenanigans in CO, there’s indications that I’m not entirely paranoid since someone is trying to get me. Heaven knows why. I’m just a chick with a relatively small blog. Shrug.)

THE INCOHERENT INSULT TROLL – You might be Clamps/Chlamydia. Though frankly, a lot of lefties fall under this. With rare exceptions, this just gets you banned, hard, straight off the gate.

I think that’s pretty much it for trolls. The “notice me sempai” ones are, without exception, the weirdest ones, and I have no idea what they think they’re doing, but then I don’t claim to understand any trolls.

That’s it for today. Stay frosty.

Reprinted from According to Hoyt for June 17, 2022