User blog:Martin J Sallberg/Trolls are mythical beasts

Just like literal trolls are mythical cryptids unsupported by empirical evidence, there is no actual support for the existence of Internet trolls as of the traditional description either. For instance, assuming that anyone expressing very unusual opinions outside the scope of traditional debate framing must do it for mere personal attention or to disturb is a fallacy from assumed motivation. What about the possibility, for example, that people are expressing unusual opinions simply because they consider it important that the opinions get known? Expressing the same opinion under different false usernames is the opposite of what would be most efficient for getting personal attention. False names, by definition, gives no personal attention. And if someone did consider it to be personal attention anyway, and did not care about the actual content of the opinions, why would they repeat the same opinions and give themselves away then? Instead of changing the opinions as randomly as the theory of "it could just as well have been any (other) bullshit" predicts that they would?

As for unusual opinions being effectively disruptive in many places, that may often be true. But does it imply that people are doing it to disrupt? No. They may do it simply because they know no suitable forum. To simply block, revert and ignore in such cases has a comparable effect to local councils banning beggars leading to them starting to beg elsewhere instead. The Internet community as a whole does not get rid of them. Try better integration techniques. For instance, advice of where to find suitable forums.

However, take very great care not to advice of stereotyped motif assumption forums. For instance, assuming all antipsychiatrists to be scientologists does nothing to integrate atheist antipsychiatrists of the "specialized psychological mechanisms are not evolvability-comparable to eyes" type, and assuming everyone who denies a certain historical event to be, say, an Area 51 conspiracy nut, a nazi, or whatever pick you take, does nothing to integrate people who believe that agreement of testimonies are due to innate panhuman delusions. And so on. Better to redirect to forums open for diverse opinions with a "no assumption of other's motivation" policy as their primary policy. If such forums do exist, links to them are welcome in the comment fields below. If they do not exist yet, they should be created pronto.