this looks a good thread.

the guy starting it , asking about 'why people troll' seems to have been banned.

was he a troll himself or something??

Martina wrote:this looks a good thread.

the guy starting it , asking about 'why people troll' seems to have been banned.

was he a troll himself or something??

Dunno. I can't see him/her on the permaban list...

http://www.rationalskepticism.org/feedb ... t2022.html

A good analysis on trolling here, I think:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0cMzl_FeZgo[/youtube]

"Sometimes haters can be the most dedicated followers."

So true.

Also confirms some of the behavior/attitudes of the 'trolls' seen in the "Insite" program above:
http://www.rationalskepticism.org/socia ... l#p1610216

I think it is related to wearing masks on Halloween or at parties. Maybe also connected to voyeurism. I remember when I first got on a chat board and it occurred to me that I could pose as anything I wanted to be. It was an odd feeling of having lost my moorings with my 'self'.

The other interesting thing I once learned when doing undercover on the xtians is that as you post you become. It screwed up my own thinking to an extent when I wrote as if I believed something that I was completely opposed to. Some really nice person could start posting shit and in doing so he builds a new self with a completely different personality.

Another factor may be that we need to step out and 'party'. That's what we call doing crazy shit that we would not ordinarily do. Don't know about you other countries but in the US we have these business on every block that sell a substance that poisons your brain and temporarily makes you a complete idiot and asshole at once. They are jam-packed with customers every night. After a night of debauchery and running around wearing lamp-shades they sit and tell amusing stories about how 'fucked-up' they got last night. "I drank so much that forgot how to wipe my ass and pull my pants up!". Ho ho.

It's like being some one else who you would never choose to actually be is fun as long as it's temporary and you have an excuse to get away with or you are anonymous and get away with it.

So on the less malevolent side it's about stepping out of our own skins. On the dark side it's an opportunity to be a bully for a few hours and not have a consequence, like getting your ass properly kicked.

Shadenfreude.

Almost Two-Thirds Of Gamers Admit 'Trolling' Online - http://www.nowgamer.com/news/1834303/al ... nline.html

Spearthrower wrote:

ScientificSkeptic wrote:It seems like trolls take what everyone is enjoying talking about rip it apart and show how it is not true.

That, to me, sounds like an educational service!

Yup, Socrates was the original troll. Back then, it's called gadfly.