The Art of Disruption

[rucky]

When there's a troll or general disruptor here on the DU, how many of us CAN'T RESIST responding? The blood pressure rises. You know you shouldn't feed the trolls, but you to it anyways. It's an almost uncontrollable impulse to swing back.

Then the troll crawls back into their cave and brags to all their buddies how much fun it was to get a rise out of so many people and how ridiculous it is that Democratic Underground doesn't let them "speak their mind" or whatever. They got some attention (some folks don't care if they get good attention or bad attention, as long as they get attention). They look like heroes and victims at the same time. What power!

There's power in this pattern: Provoke, provoke, provoke. Get attacked back. Act like a victim.

You can call bullshit, but that just makes you look like the bully. If you don't attack back, you look weak. It's a frustrating mess.

The GOP does that to the Dems time and time again. And there's just enough of us out there who take the bait every time, and give them that power to disrupt. They keep doing it because there's power in it. How many flamewars have we had here because Dems DON'T fight back? I'm not saying we shouldn't, because we should - but we need to do it in a way that denies them their chickenshit satisfaction of false victimhood.

I'm sure there's some psy-ops manuals that instruct people how to do this effectively. Or some people just have the natural "talent" to provoke the opposition. It's not in my nature, and I'm not really sure what the magic words are that get people's blood boiling, but it's worth taking a look at.

I'm not sure what the right strategy is in confronting chickenshits like this - be it DU trolls, or Rovian spinmeisters - but maybe we can put our collective heads together and figure this out.

[greyl]

1. The Subtle Art of Trolling:

www.urban75.com/Mag/troll.html <<--- that psy-ops manual you were wondering about.

[rucky]

3. Holy Schmoly!

interesting stuff. that is certainly a different world.

[BleedingHeartPatriot]

2. Well, if the responses send them back to their caves, it can't be all bad.

If they want to huddle there with a handful of other miserable souls complaining/bragging or whatever, I'm all for it. It is their Constitutional right, after all. :-)

They won't change. Here on DU, I haven't really lamented their return to the subterranean world after their inevitable TS's.

MKJ

on edit, after reading greyl's link, I have to add, if one is dealing with those for whom an entire existence is based on creating a futile, never ending argument on the internet, one can employ any and all strategies, with little effect.

The DU model seems to work fairly well, ignore and/or tombstone. Engagement is that for which they lust. Although, it can be kind of fun to tag team debate the less polished of them.

:evilgrin:

MKJ

[stillcool]

4. I think it stems from

our legal system. One side accuses and the other side defends. The problem is the design of the debate is not intended to evoke any truth, but to win or lose a point of contention. The fact that the argument itself has little to do with reality as a whole seems to be irrelevant. Sort of like what the meaning of 'is' is. If two sides are continuously arguing a false premise, no one gets to discern truth. Pretty good way to keep everyone confused. We seem to be stuck in the very narrow framing of he said/she said, leaving out any aspect of the "I", relating to personal reality and the consequences of political decisions.