musicalman
Well-Known Member
Hi everyone,
As a person who tries to understand different perspectives, I like to get a sense of why people do what they do. I'm not always successful, but I enjoy trying to work out other people's points of view, since it is therapeutic for me sometimes. But one thing I have never understood the mindset or purpose of is trolling.
From my understanding, a troll, at least in this case, is a person who likes to post remarks on social media deliberately for the purposes of causing confusion, or strong emotional responses or reactions. What I'm having trouble with is understanding why someone would deliberately want to do that.
The reason I even decided to post this thread here btw was twofold: Firstly, I fell victim to a trollish comment which offended me greatly and caused a bit of an awkward kerfuffle last night, and secondly because I'm sort of afraid for those autistics and other people who can't tell the difference. Hell even I can't tell the difference between a troll and a serious comment most of the time. I'm getting better, but I like to think I'm fairly well-equipped socially and I still struggle with this. I guess I'm not alone, though.
To clarify, I have trolled in the past. Well, if you count saying things to friends to get a reaction out of them. But when I did that, there were two key differences between me and the trolls I'm talking about. First, they're my friends and I know they won't take me seriously when my sarcasm comes out, and second, if things start going south, I'm always prepared to back out and let them know I was just messing around. I would never say something serious in public or in a large group to toy with people's deep emotions or to start a riot as it were. If I did, I would feel bad if someone took it too seriously, and I could easily say something which would deeply offend or otherwise hurt them. I can't take that chance in good conscience.
So I guess what I'm confused about isn't so much the principal, since with friends or people you know, it's good fun to say something stupid to see what they'll do. The confusing bit for me is why some people are willing/able to go so far with it. I love a good bit of sarcasm so long as it's clearly sarcasm, but I don't love blurring those lines on purpose and reveling in the fires that result, or even worse, pretending I'm being serious when I'm not, just to increase the temperature to melting point. I don't know if I'll ever truly understand why people feel okay doing this on a large scale, but I figured I'd ask, just in case it can be explained.
So yeah, what do you think? Am I just weird? Lol
As a person who tries to understand different perspectives, I like to get a sense of why people do what they do. I'm not always successful, but I enjoy trying to work out other people's points of view, since it is therapeutic for me sometimes. But one thing I have never understood the mindset or purpose of is trolling.
From my understanding, a troll, at least in this case, is a person who likes to post remarks on social media deliberately for the purposes of causing confusion, or strong emotional responses or reactions. What I'm having trouble with is understanding why someone would deliberately want to do that.
The reason I even decided to post this thread here btw was twofold: Firstly, I fell victim to a trollish comment which offended me greatly and caused a bit of an awkward kerfuffle last night, and secondly because I'm sort of afraid for those autistics and other people who can't tell the difference. Hell even I can't tell the difference between a troll and a serious comment most of the time. I'm getting better, but I like to think I'm fairly well-equipped socially and I still struggle with this. I guess I'm not alone, though.
To clarify, I have trolled in the past. Well, if you count saying things to friends to get a reaction out of them. But when I did that, there were two key differences between me and the trolls I'm talking about. First, they're my friends and I know they won't take me seriously when my sarcasm comes out, and second, if things start going south, I'm always prepared to back out and let them know I was just messing around. I would never say something serious in public or in a large group to toy with people's deep emotions or to start a riot as it were. If I did, I would feel bad if someone took it too seriously, and I could easily say something which would deeply offend or otherwise hurt them. I can't take that chance in good conscience.
So I guess what I'm confused about isn't so much the principal, since with friends or people you know, it's good fun to say something stupid to see what they'll do. The confusing bit for me is why some people are willing/able to go so far with it. I love a good bit of sarcasm so long as it's clearly sarcasm, but I don't love blurring those lines on purpose and reveling in the fires that result, or even worse, pretending I'm being serious when I'm not, just to increase the temperature to melting point. I don't know if I'll ever truly understand why people feel okay doing this on a large scale, but I figured I'd ask, just in case it can be explained.
So yeah, what do you think? Am I just weird? Lol