User blog:Jackninja5DipperGravityFalls/How to Handle a Troll

Hi, I'm that guy with an incredibly long username that many of you use copy and paste to type out. It has come to my attention that trolling is still a big issue and I have noticed some people responding to it incorrectly so I will tell you how to deal with trolls.

Tip 1: Don't Acknowledge Them
As a former troll (outside of Wikia), I know what trolls want: Your reaction. If you show them that you're angry, they have succeeded in their trolling as the point of it is to attack serious people to invoke a reaction because they have nothing better to do with their lives. A way to prevent them from winning is to ignore it completely, which seems hard in practice but it can be done when you think about how they are just doing stupid things for attention. Ignoring them could potentially bore them and make them give up. If they PM you, you can either ignore that and read what the troll sends you if you love to read the attempts they make or block them. As for message walls, which are harder, you can always close the thread. Removing it is also an option but I don't recommend it as it could make Tip 2 a lot harder. Do not insult the troll back. Not only would this negatively impact your reputation on the wiki but it would also be extremely pointless since the troll doesn't care what you think of them. All they're doing is laughing whether what they did was funny or not (and more often than so it's not). Also, if you're in a chatroom and there's a chat bot that bans/kicks those who swears, letting them do as they wish could immediately get them banned if they use swearing in their tactics, which is quite satisfying to watch.

Tip 2: Report Them
Even if you follow Tip 1, there is one exception to the "don't acknowledge them" rule. If they are trolling, it is usually against the policy of the wiki so report them to an admin with evidence either through a private message on chat or another site. You can also try their wall but it does have the risk of the troll finding out and making replies to it, although that may be of benefit as they usually troll when replying too. Do not attempt to take matters into your own hands. No one likes a mini-mod and there's really nothing you can do to punish the troll unless you are an admin or moderator. If the trolling involves spam or vandalism, there is a beautiful wiki for things just like that. Also, don't tell them "you're trolling. Stop." They don't care. Doing that will probably make things worse. It's not "feeding the troll" but telling them to stop does no good as they may focus on trolling you for doing so.

Tip 3: Temporarily Leave and Ask an Admin to Tell You When the Troll is Banned
Now, if you have a hard time following Tip 1, you could always leave and while reporting to the admin, tell them to let you know when they banned the troll, assuming this is done on a site outside of the wiki. This might seem like defeat but the troll will have nothing to do if the victim is gone, not to mention that when said-victim returns, they will be banned.

Tip 0
Now, if you cannot ignore the troll and you don't want to leave temporarily, then I'd say just focus on something else on the wiki if that's possible.

Thanks for reading if you actually did read it. :P