Why do we focus so much on Trolls?

[Neurotic Void Melody]

Not sure why we should be treating them differently to bullies in the meatspace really, just cos they're utilising an even more cowardly avenue to avoid repercussions.

 

[Hawki]

We focus on trolls because they hide under bridges and try to eat anyone who crosses them.

...what? You mean those aren't the trolls you're talking about?

 

[Xprimentyl]

If a group being labelled is one an individual doesn?t associate with, align with or doesn?t care to know more intimately, they?re going to see the anomalies within it as the potential of the remaining whole, and why dive deeper for anything less than an intellectual pursuit? No, that group has a disease, so I?m gonna stay over here and tell my group to give that group a wide berth. When I moved to Texas 9 years ago, I didn?t notice the literal tens of thousands of perfectly fine drivers; what I did notice was the handful of drivers (and I use that term loosely) who cut me off, crossed three lanes of traffic to make a right turn 200 feet ahead, drove 10 mph under the speed limit, etc.; I noticed enough of them to report back home to my Ohio folks that ?Texans can?t drive.? And 9 years later, as that ?handful? has itself grown to ?literal tens of thousands,? I stand by that statement; Texans can NOT drive; these bastards should have stayed on horseback because cars are not their thing; they just can?t do it. I mean, come the fuck ON; the same left lane has been shut down for construction for a week and a half; how is it half of these assholes don?t notice the huge, blinking, bright orange, right-pointing ?lane closed? arrow visible from a half mile away until they?re sitting in front of it at a dead stop with their blinker on waiting for traffic to stop and let them back into the flow?!?!.... What was the topic again?

 

[ObsidianJones_v1legacy]

I don't think its necessarily comparable to a 13 year old saying they would kill you on xbox live. Trolls run the ages all the way up to seniors. There are adults who will send death threats, and I think its a little different when there are several thousand of them and they find out where you live and like to go. People get calls on their personal phones and death threat messages containing their adresses. And I think its totally different for us normal people who have the fact we are just another of the millions of normal people compared to those internet personas with tons of people watching them.

It's only a minority but a minority on the internet can still mean thousands of people. Wouldn't it disturb you and make you paranoid to know that thousands of people want to find you, have the means through doxxing and might want to seriously kill/harm you? Not really comparable to a handful of shitheads on xbox live.

Remember when a fan who was 'oh so In love' with Meg Turney came to her house and went to kill her boyfriend Gavin he brought a gun, they managed to hide from him and call the cops and the dude killed himself in the driveway. Don't you think stuff like that makes them worry every time they get another hundred death threats? You're right that most aren't serious but how do we know?

Why not? We have the term Swatting because of how many people use any means necessary to harm or mess with gamers who are beating them in a certain game. We, sadly, have situations of people finding players [https://www.cbsnews.com/news/man-chokes-kid-for-beating-him-in-call-of-duty-game/] after a game and choking them. There are videos of fights that happen in video game cafes [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pJ7b3Gbc_MQ]. "Grown men" [https://www.newsday.com/long-island/crime/fortnite-threat-long-island-arrest-1.21103607] send texts to eleven year olds threatening to shoot up their schools. Overwatch [https://www.reddit.com/r/Overwatch/comments/7ys62q/death_threats_racism_and_more_what_can_you_do/] is Over Watch.

And we can easily get into streamers. Like the streamer who was dropped from her sponsors after tweeting men are trash [https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/mb8w98/gaming-company-razer-drops-streamer-for-calling-men-trash-says-its-hate-speech] over a tasteless picture. She got stupid threats over it. Summit1G [https://www.gamebyte.com/top-twitch-streamer-gets-death-threat-causing-him-to-stay-indoors/] was so unnerved that he didn't leave his house for a few days. Amouranth [https://www.polygon.com/2018/6/27/17506414/amouranth-twitch-thot-streamer-cosplayer-alinity-backlash] considers it normal to receive such attention, which is unfortunate. Dr. Disrespect [https://kotaku.com/after-shooting-at-dr-disrespects-house-streamers-are-c-1829013016] was shot at, Twice.

Let me be clear. This isn't to forgive or explain away this behavior. It's not even to excuse it because it's common place. The purpose of this thread is that I feel we erroneously attribute the behavior of the deplorables to the group they identify with, and I think that is a disservice. The death threats I received weren't due because those people were gamers. It would be wrong and strictly false of me to label gamers as the problem. It's due to those people being wrong in the head. If we were playing tennis, they would probably do the same. If this was chess, they would rage. Driving, you name it.

Because, yes, it does happen. A Gambler [https://www.justice.gov/usao-ma/pr/california-man-pleads-guilty-sending-death-threats-dozens-professional-and-college] threatening Athletes (Bonus Racism Find!). Soccer players being killed because of one goal [https://colombiareports.com/25-year-after-andres-escobars-death-threats-of-violence-still-plague-colombias-football/]. FootBall Hooliganism [https://www.goal.com/en-us/news/football-hooligans-firms-films-violence-culture-among/16dewe1zjd5cs1wwaky23qv9zk]. High School Basketball [https://usatodayhss.com/2019/utah-high-school-basketball-racism-death-threats] (little racism in that one as well). Singing while Kneeling [https://www.si.com/nfl/2017/09/29/national-anthem-protests-singer-meghan-linsey-death-threats-kneeling] and merely talking to Jay-z and Beyonce [https://uproxx.com/dimemag/beyonce-jay-z-nicole-curran-nba-finals-game-3-interaction-social-media-death-threats/2/] receives death threats in this darkest timeline.

It's not because these people are fans of Beyonce, Soccer, or ignoring the very police brutality that still threatens the players' lives that they spewed vile things. It's because they are vile people. The Beyhive (I feel dirty typing that out) shouldn't be labeled for the actions of a fraction. Nor should Soccer (Football) fans be likened to Hooliganism, or Gamblers as potentially violent and racist sore losers. These people's disgusting actions should be their own cross. If you willingly go to a subset of a group in strict efforts to cause damage and mayhem, then fine, that subset should be known for violence. But not the group that they originally spawned from.

Because this is the important bit... That group has no organization, no charter, and no control over what a group of people decide to do on their own. We always should go after the perpretator of a crime, not anyone who has a tenuous link but has never had anything to do with the actual crime. That's what despots do.

OK. Let's say for sake of argument that I agree with your premise about everyone/most of us identifying whole groups by their worst members. I'd then say it depends on how vocal they are and how much leniency the rest of the group gives them; different groups have different standards for their worst members. Even the term Troll in this topic kinda downplays the consequences of the fringe's actions, and it groups together highly malicious members with pranky troublemakers. So, here is a question: if we are willing to ignore the Trolls' noise (the usual recommendation for dealing with Trolls), why not to ignore the unfair grouping noise too? What's the difference? Both are just noise.

Because of reputation. You deal with the offender, not the offender's grouping if they didn't actively take place in the crime.

If a man beats up another man due to their beef, you don't look at the group of people he plays Basketball pick-up games on the weekend and wonder if they had a hand in the crime or are as capable of the same amount of violence. It would be illegal to do so.

It's because Defamation is such an important part of our daily lives that in the American legal system, Defamation is covered in two distinct ways so there is no wiggle room. Libel and Slander. Reputation is key to almost all aspects of life. It's not what you know, it's who you know. Or more to the point, what people know about you.

There's a reason why if I'm pulled over by the police, they check my background. If I'm free and clear, they assume they have no reason to worry about me and give me my ticket to send me on my way. But if my background comes through that I have known gang affiliations, they know to give me a closer one over. It does not become 'just noise' if it can be used to justifiably scrutinize you even though you've done nothing wrong.

Sidebar. Do not ignore Trolls who threaten your life or hurl racial epithets. Report them. Not only to dissuade such tactics, but for your own personal safety.

Trolls who say you suck? Not worth your time.

 

[Anti-American Eagle]

Because they're an easily digestible form of content that engages our anger centers as much as our comedy centers.

 

[Thaluikhain]

I honestly think we do it because its easy. Empathy, understanding, respect and mutual regard - all of that is hard, and its finite. You can run out of energy/will to empathize with a person and we all just have real life and real humans to deal with day to day that consume a lot of what there is to give. When I encounter a jackass I could do the right thing and try to understand why they're angry or talk to them, or I could tell them to fuck off, file them and everyone who agreed with them even peripherally as pricks and neatly strike off a whole swath of people as those I don't have to deal with.

Thats why I don't understand how a person can seriously believe being an aggressive douche for this or that cause helps you at all. Full honesty I'm glad when I can safely de-list a group from my energy pool because between work and family there's only so much left to dole out. Being angry at a troll takes zero effort or investment, so given the first chance I and many others are happy to say "oh you're all douche bags - get fucked douche bags". Worrying about grans hip is taking a lot of my empathy and the fewer groups I have to stretch the remainder over the better.

I'm sure many people are less fundamentally aware of it, but everybody does it. The further you are from family the easier it is, and things like devs, fans, political groups and so on who don't even exist in meatspace for many of us are the furthest thing from an empathy priority.

Been away from my computer for a bit, otherwise I'd have responded earlier, but there's truth in this. Now, that's not to say that there aren't some people you can't just instantly label as terrible and be correct about. But there's plenty of people you can instantly label as terrible and be only probably or possibly correct about, and it's often too much effort to not just lump them in with the others.