Playing With Trolls

i'm positive that you've all just been _dying_ for the second installment to the story of my slugfest with the name-stealing troll at political animal. the high level of trolling and parody-trolling in the comment threads there and the explosion of activity on feminist blogs have made me an infrequent participant over the last six months. the first installment of my exchange with 'no pills for spacebaby' is here.

the trolls at political animal are in a class of their own. there is Al. Al now exists only as an astonishingly long-lived parody of a right-wing regular commenter. there are rumors that the original Al died of cancer a long while ago. there's Charlie, everybody's favorite little psycho, whose insanity justifies its own multi-part epic. i couldn't possibly forget to mention Norman Rodgers whose entire routine is a relentless stream of verbal abuse against Kevin. Norman is stupid, so he's boring and not really worthy of any commentary. Patton is an All-Caps nutfreak who is entertaining only because the parody-Pattons are so funny.

i digress. in the midst of my mud-flinging with 'no pills for spacebaby' someone using the handle 'Mandy' posted a meandering, off-topic comment that she didn't like the government telling her what to do because she didn't want to serve aggressive and verbally abusive customers. although her comment had nothing to do with conscience clauses, 'no pills for spacebaby' told me to read her 'thoughtful' contribution to the discussion:

"none of this answers my question -- what is 'crazy' or 'abnormal' about my post?"

I already told you, the whole thing. It's just a stupid rant, devoid of any facts or argument, but full of name-calling.

I suggest you read Mandy's thoughtful post above, calm down, educate yourself, think, try to learn some civility, and then you might in a position to actually post something serious on the issue, instead of just vomiting raw anger.

a boistrous gale of laughter rose from my belly when i read this. a _troll_ was lecturing me about the necessity of civility and content-rich contributions. i also question the unstated assumption that my expression of raw anger was less acceptable than his passive-aggressive kindergarten harassment. i still wonder if 'Mandy' was actually the troll in another guise because her comment was such a convenient tool for trying to change the subject, a favorite troll tactic [typo corrected]:

I suggest you read Mandy's thoughtful post above ...

mandy's thoughtful post includes an unwillingness to serve rude customers. that has absolutely nothing to do with the topic, nor does it address the fact that the movement is clearly gunning for customers of one gender only. quit trying to change the subject.

... actually post something serious on the issue, instead of just vomiting raw anger.

i love how you like to pretend that i have not already done this, and you are still being an asshole by using that handle. stop lecturing me about respectful civility until you start behaving with the same. you are not in a position to judge anything about my contributions here because you continue to behave like a troll.

I already told you, the whole thing. It's just a stupid rant, devoid of any facts or argument, but full of name-calling.

if 'the whole thing' is crazy and abnormal, it should be a breeze to pick out specific examples. i'm still waiting on those.

the troll's response was an exercise in incredible obtuseness. trolls will often play at being deliberately obtuse to get you to repeat your arguments over and over again. comparing me to a rude customer would have been relevant if my rant had actually been directed at a flustered, inoffensive pharmacist. i reserve the right to ream the shit out of one who sanctimoniously denies my prescriptions. refusal clause legislation might protect the pharmacist from being fired, but it does not protect him or her from my reaction to an unwarranted attempt to butt into my personal business:

"mandy's thoughtful post includes an unwillingness to serve rude customers."

She didn't say that. She refuses to serve really obnoxious assholes who call her names or threaten her. Seems reasonable to me. Given your behavior in this thread, you seem pretty likely to fit that description yourself.

"... the movement is clearly gunning for customers of one gender only."

What movement? What evidence do you have to offer that this alleged movement is "gunning for customers of one gender only?"

"i love how you like to pretend that i have not already done this ..."

You haven't done it. All you've done is call people names ("fucktards" was especially lovely) and make various unsupported accusations.

"stop lecturing me about respectful civility until you start behaving with the same."

I'll do that just as soon as you show some sign that you are willing to behave with civility. As long as you continue to behave like a child throwing a temper tantrum, you'll continue to be treated as one.

i wondered how long it would take the troll to resort to the old tactic of calling an angry feminist a 'child' and her reaction to discrimination against women a 'temper tantrum'. it's probably the second rule in Debate Manual For The Tiny-Dicked Army Of People Who Are Threatened By Angry Feminists. trolls also incessantly repeat themselves to draw you into repeating your own arguments over and over just so they can claim (again) that you never made any arguments. they will delicately swoon over your language and prissily lecture you about civility and politeness so much that it's impossible to believe they don't have a permanent broomstick installation in their asses. it's often effective to simply call them it [lightly edited for the usual offenses against the english language and rules of punctuation]:

"mandy's thoughtful post includes an unwillingness to serve rude customers."

She didn't say that. She refuses to serve really obnoxious assholes who call her names or threaten her [emphasis mine]. Seems reasonable to me. Given your behavior in this thread, you seem pretty likely to fit that description yourself.

do you have a reading comprehension problem?

" ... the movement is clearly gunning for customers of one gender only."

What movement? What evidence do you have to offer that this alleged movement is "gunning for customers of one gender only?"

i provided a list of examples, and your choice to ignore them in order to further troll me is not going to make me post them again. either address them or admit that you can't.

"i love how you like to pretend that i have not already done this ... "

You haven't done it. All you've done is call people names ("fucktards" was especially lovely) and make various unsupported accusations.

hi, excuse me, but i am not the topic of this thread. either address the examples offered, or stop this crap trolling. you have singled me out and attacked me personally for expressing a general anger at misogynist pharmacists compromising the health of women, and you're still trying to act like you have a right to demand polite behavior from me. shove it, hypocrite.

stop lecturing until you behave in the manner in which you demand from me. drop your asshole handle, and maybe, just maybe you have a tiny little iota of a right to judge crap all about what i said or how i said it, troll. yes, i cursed. stop acting like you've got a case of the vapors. you've seen a few r-rated movies. get over it.

I'll do that just as soon as you show some sign that you are willing to behave with civility. As long as you continue to behave like a child throwing a temper tantrum, you'll continue to be treated as one.

good god, are you the church lady or something? you are a _TROLL_ who attacked me _PERSONALLY_ for expressing a general anger at _NO SPECIFIC PERSON_, and you're pretending to lecture me on good behavior? you can't even use your real name, coward. you forget repeatedly that the topic of this thread is the latest escalation in the refusal clause war. again, cite _SPECIFIC PASSAGES_ where i offer _SPECIFIC EXAMPLES_ of why it is crap and respond to them, not _ME_.

you are not qualified to judge how civil my response to an attack on women's access to basic health care services vital to their well-being 'should' be. people who support this crap are no better than people who supported racial segregation, and my profanity and anger in response to it is not a childish temper tantrum. it's an appropriate response to a coordinated effort to throw up obstacles to women's access to basic medicine like birth control, vitamins, and antibiotics. notice they were refusing to fill prescriptions from a women's health clinic? they aren't refusing to fill prescriptions for jock itch powder from The Manly Clinic.

drop the prissy schoolmarm act and respond to my arguments because i did make some despite your trolly attempt to pretend that i didn't.

this troll was actually quite tireless. it was extremely difficult to dislodge him from his talking points. one effective means of deflecting a troll is to piss them off. sometimes brute force works, but a good troll-hunter should try to develop more elegant and subtle means of attack. the troll's reply indicated that i finally managed to draw blood:

"i provided a list of examples ..."

You didn't provide any evidence.

"stop lecturing"

I told you. I'll stop lecturing you just as soon as you stop behaving like a petulant child. If you have a serious, fact-based argument to make, then make it. All you've done so far is call people names and make various wild, unsubstantiated accusations.

"you can't even use your real name, coward."

So "spacebaby" is your real name, is it, bitch?

one could certainly say that he dropped the prissy schoolmarm persona. i considered this a real win. not only that, shortly thereafter i discovered that i had some supporters. one of them outed the troll after he called me a bitch. that's when things became _really_ interesting. while i had been away, Political Animal's Troll Hall of Fame had acquired a new member.