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Date Posted: 16:28:39 12/03/02 Tue
Author: Don
Subject: Re: Trolling: the art of being other
In reply to: Buffy's vampire 's message, "Trolling: the art of being other" on 12:39:02 12/03/02 Tue

>Don Albertson has taken a light-hearted approach to

Well, there are trolls and then there are Trolls. I don't know if my interpretation of the difference is standard or deviant but to me the lowercased troll has more in common with the verb "to troll" which has its roots in fishing. The bait or lure is dragged through the water to make it look alive and the prey species is tricked into either attacking it or trying to eat it. In contrast a Troll is a creature of legends with a vaguely human appearance and a taste for raw meat. The meat can be freshly killed but more commonly is something that might attract carrion eaters.

Internet trolling combines the two. Sometimes the person who is doing the trolling is a Troll-like character who takes delight in getting the prey species to respond. The eating is purely metaphorical although it may be that Trolls do get some sort of psychological boost out of the activity.

I may be mistaken, but I've always treated BV as more of an agent provacateur or what the boys back in Snyder County would have called an "agitator" or "aggravator". The trolls seem to have a heuristic element to them for they invite us to learn something although it's not always clear what it is we are supposed to be learning. Most of the time the prey species which is lured into the open is a self-righteous prig of the sort who has never had occasion to question anything more complex than what colour tie to wear with their conventional white shirt today. The deeper questions of what is right and what makes it right never seem to cross their mind. (There's a lot of them in Texas.)

BTW it looks like the comment about ITLOD having a thing was a bit too much for someone as it has disappeared from WF. Drat! That had a lot of promise.

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