Random Thoughts Anew

[ergative]

The fact that the audience is annoyed doesn't make it trolling; it's when annoying the audience is the intended (and *only) objective that makes it trolling (in my opinion).

Why only?

As someone said, "If two people agree on everything, then one of them is redundant." What's the point of a discussion where every time someone says something everyone else says, "Me Too!"?
The discussion only becomes interesting when someone says something like "but what about.....".

I'm sorry, I didn't follow that response at all.

Are you saying it's trolling when the goal is to be annoying, and it ceases to be trolling if there is also another goal?

Yes, that's how I would define it. Trolling (IMHO) is being offensive purely for the purpose of being offensive. Stating an unpopular and or controversial point of view may offend a lot of people, but if the point is to fuel a serious discussion then it's not trolling (in my view). Otherwise basically any political debate would qualify as trolling.

In principle I agree. In practice I think there's either a lot of self-deception, or a lot of bad-faith, which leads many people to pretend they want to fuel serious discussion, when in fact they just like getting a reaction. (This is a sub-genre of trolling known as 'sea-lioning'.)

[marshwiggle]

Are you saying it's trolling when the goal is to be annoying, and it ceases to be trolling if there is also another goal?

Yes, that's how I would define it. Trolling (IMHO) is being offensive purely for the purpose of being offensive. Stating an unpopular and or controversial point of view may offend a lot of people, but if the point is to fuel a serious discussion then it's not trolling (in my view). Otherwise basically any political debate would qualify as trolling.

In principle I agree. In practice I think there's either a lot of self-deception, or a lot of bad-faith, which leads many people to pretend they want to fuel serious discussion, when in fact they just like getting a reaction. (This is a sub-genre of trolling known as 'sea-lioning'.)

But how much of that is based predominantly on whether the view being expressed is in the minority rather than the majority? Do people expressing the popular opinion get accused (by their own "side") of either trolling or sea-lioning?

[mahagonny]

*lots of discussion techniques involve saying things to "provoke" an audience; usually the point is to raise some sort of contradiction that the audience hasn't previously considered so its purpose is to make them rethink their position, rather than just to be upset.

I'm not hoping to get anyone to rethink their position. Although it's fine if that happens. I'm just having random thoughts. If anyone doesn't like it, they have a problem I guess.

Sure. My point was that even some situations where a person's intent is to provoke, it still isn't what I would call "trolling".

Most of the time when people here mention trolling, what they convey to me is their frustration with not being able to control what is posted or allowed.

That's the strange part, especially in a setting populated by academics. In middle school, being surrounded by a group of people who all (appear to) think exactly alike is desirable; among intellectuals it used to be seen as stifling (and naive). Now it's "enlightened".

We have a culture war today. The opposing views are not considered different views. They are automatically assumed to be the product of bad motives. And almost as often, of irredeemably bad people.

[FishProf]

Are you saying it's trolling when the goal is to be annoying, and it ceases to be trolling if there is also another goal?

Yes, that's how I would define it. Trolling (IMHO) is being offensive purely for the purpose of being offensive. Stating an unpopular and or controversial point of view may offend a lot of people, but if the point is to fuel a serious discussion then it's not trolling (in my view). Otherwise basically any political debate would qualify as trolling.

In principle I agree. In practice I think there's either a lot of self-deception, or a lot of bad-faith, which leads many people to pretend they want to fuel serious discussion, when in fact they just like getting a reaction. (This is a sub-genre of trolling known as 'sea-lioning'.)

But how much of that is based predominantly on whether the view being expressed is in the minority rather than the majority? Do people expressing the popular opinion get accused (by their own "side") of either trolling or sea-lioning?

Sometimes they do.  "Entertainment" is a goal for some, but maybe that's the same as being annoying.  Is that what you mean? 

This is from Wikipedia, for what it is worth: "Sealioning (also sea-lioning and sea lioning) is a type of trolling or harassment that consists of pursuing people with relentless requests for evidence, often tangential or previously addressed, while maintaining a pretense of civility and sincerity ("I'm just trying to have a debate"), and feigning ignorance of the subject matter.It may take the form of "incessant, bad-faith invitations to engage in debate", and has been likened to a denial-of-service attack targeted at human beings. The term originated with a 2014 strip of the webcomic Wondermark by David Malki,  which The Independent called, "..the most apt description of Twitter you'll ever see"."

[FishProf]

For the curious, here's the above mentioned comic.

[marshwiggle]

Let me give the example of someone I see as a trolling master. Trump, especially early in his presidency, was a master of trolling. He would say outrageous things, completely off the top of his head, and often even say completely contradictory things a few days later. He did it because he realized that the more outrageous it was, the more media coverage he'd get. All he cared about was being the top news story, and it worked. It's not clear even he believed half of what he said, but it served his purpose. The media were so intent on clutching their pearls and saying "HOW DARE YOU!" that they kept giving him all the attention he wanted.

[FishProf]

Do you think what he is doing now is still trolling?  Or is he genuinely making the claims for some other goal (like saving his own skin)?  That would then NOT be trolling, based on the above definition.

[marshwiggle]

Do you think what he is doing now is still trolling?  Or is he genuinely making the claims for some other goal (like saving his own skin)?  That would then NOT be trolling, based on the above definition.

Because part of his point is just to get publicity, (since in politics getting attention is vital for power), then it is still trolling (by my definition). (Although, before and now, since part of his message was that he doesn't care whether the media likes him, then there is still an element of the publicity he gets that proves that point. So some of his message is true, whether he's trolling or not.)

[FishProf]

To the extent that the right is trying to "own the libs", they are trolling.  But when they are trying to convince their base, they aren't?  Or are they also trolling their base, hoping for a different "rise" out of them?

[mahagonny]

Let me give the example of someone I see as a trolling master. Trump, especially early in his presidency, was a master of trolling. He would say outrageous things, completely off the top of his head, and often even say completely contradictory things a few days later. He did it because he realized that the more outrageous it was, the more media coverage he'd get. All he cared about was being the top news story, and it worked. It's not clear even he believed half of what he said, but it served his purpose. The media were so intent on clutching their pearls and saying "HOW DARE YOU!" that they kept giving him all the attention he wanted.

The (liberal) media have called every republican at least as far back as Ronald Reagan 'a racist.' Which is much different from how they see themselves. They see themselves as confronting their implicit bias and in the process establishing that they are trustworthy and trying to improve themselves. But almost any republican is easy pickings for the irredeemably and obliviously, if not intentionally, racist, smear. Trump calculated that there's no reason to cultivate a relationship with them, and there's traction in pointing out the disingenuous, sometimes nasty, and heavily biased things they do, and calling into question whether they have any serious intent in being a good to anyone but themselves. The democrats, as usual, are not very interested in what voters think, being much more interested in what they should think. So they could never have believed that what Trump was doing could work, and now they have to call it 'trolling.' They never saw it coming. What they don't want to say is, bombastic and outlandish as he was, it wasn't hard to tell he honestly hates the media, and it would turn out to be something that resonated with voters. Ronald Reagan was the last one to dare to imply the liberal media sucked. It didn't hurt him politically either. I suspect Trump remembered that.

[mahagonny]

Back to randomness

I have a class with a student from China who is perhaps tired of trying to get Americans to pronounce his name correctly. He is calls himself 'Rock.' In the same class is a student named Roland. They are buddies.

[apl68]

Although Nashville is the capital of country music, in a week-long vacation there I seldom heard anybody other than myself speaking with a recognizably rural accent.  I guess the old regional accents really are heading for extinction now.  If I live to a ripe old age, I may have anthropologists making recordings of my voice.

[ab_grp]

It is very sad when friends pass away, but I it might help if their Facebook pages indicated this in some permanent way.  Seeing multiple people wish "happy birthday and many more!" to someone who passed away months ago is a bit jarring.  I would think they would notice the previous posts about the deceased (including obituary posts) or even the "happy heavenly birthday" messages from today! Of course, they may interpret that as hoping that the deceased's birthday will be heavenly.  Who knows.  I guess it just shows that they aren't very close friends? Should someone tell them? Maybe they just forgot.  It's a little awkward, but maybe they'd like to know to edit or delete their posts.   

[apl68]

It is very sad when friends pass away, but I it might help if their Facebook pages indicated this in some permanent way.  Seeing multiple people wish "happy birthday and many more!" to someone who passed away months ago is a bit jarring.  I would think they would notice the previous posts about the deceased (including obituary posts) or even the "happy heavenly birthday" messages from today! Of course, they may interpret that as hoping that the deceased's birthday will be heavenly.  Who knows.  I guess it just shows that they aren't very close friends? Should someone tell them? Maybe they just forgot.  It's a little awkward, but maybe they'd like to know to edit or delete their posts.

Not Facebook, but I've seen message boards that created permanent memorials to deceased forum members.  It seemed like a nice gesture.

[mamselle]

I think we have a few here, back a couple years, for Pry3, InfoPath, and maybe Fiona...

There were a few more on the CHE iteration of the Forum, too.

M.