Talk:Don't feed the Troll/Archive2

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Trolling

Unless I'm greatly mistaken, which I don't think I am, the term "troll" arose after the term "trolling" came about, trolling being the activity of attempting to get as many responses to a post as possible (as in trolling for fish) and it was the blatantly offensive posting that trollers used (effective in getting responses) that lent itself to calling the poster (troller) a "troll." Anybody mind if I include this in the article? Or does anyone have information to the contrary? -Smyth 16:54, 19 September 2007 (EDT

linuxian

was a troll

Another possibility

Learn from a young child - keep on asking 'Why?' Anna Livia (talk) 18:40, 3 October 2018 (UTC)

This works for some kinds of trolls, but for alt-right flavors of troll on modern social media, it grants them the opportunity to deliver pre-written recruitment-centric propaganda to new audiences continuously. I don't know that it's wrong to do it that way, but engagement is engagement, and if it makes you look infantile, and them look informed, it's bad. ikanreed ^{🐐Bleat at me} 18:49, 3 October 2018 (UTC)

There are various types of troll and a number of appropriate ways of dealing with them (not limited to the ones mentioned above and in the article) - and one can be more subtle than 'plain why' (or one can switch between the various approaches while one is sufficiently interested enough to pursue them.

Those being trolled have the power arising from the troll needing an audience and of amusing themselves in the process. Anna Livia (talk) 22:58, 3 October 2018 (UTC)

The 'look at me and my juvenile naughty words' are best treated with 'Have you finished your homework?' if any action is necessary and probably little can be done with the 'legends in their own world views/unless you support my worldview #you are doomed#' and similar. The dividing line between someone who 'enjoys a good ding-dong debate/testing your and their views' and a troll can be somewhat fluid (and depend in part upon how the discussion is handled) - and it may be possible to encourage troll-likes to become debaters. And sometimes it can be amusing/help creativity to engage with some trolls - thinking of appropriate responses etc.

Perhaps there could be a Funspace article - The Troll Support Outreach Group, to help at least some of these poor benighted creatures leave their curtained rooms and enjoy interacting with the Real World, and training them in snark and other ways of creative engagement. Anna Livia (talk) 11:35, 4 October 2018 (UTC)