Trolls, jerks, dicks, and entitled rectal orifices everywhere.
This was a comment on my Facebook fan page in response to a tip I’d posted. Apparently, the feature I was discussing either hadn’t yet been made available in the commenter’s account, or they couldn’t find it. As a result, I was the one at fault for trying to be helpful.
Now, I get this kind of thing from time to time. On my website, abusive questions are ignored and inappropriate comments deleted. On YouTube, I can’t really keep up, but I try to do the same.
The poster of this comment apparently thought twice about leaving it up. Shortly after I replied, “A personal attack? Wow”, his comment disappeared.
But it got me thinking. Is the internet turning people into jerks?
The internet and social media aren’t necessarily creating more jerks, but they’re giving existing jerks a bigger audience with more visibility. It seems like there are more than ever, but they’ve probably been there all along. With all that visibility, it’s easy to overlook the grateful, respectful people helping one another. Since they’re less noisy, it may seem otherwise, but they overwhelmingly outnumber the jerks.
The internet is a playground
I’m using the term jerk or troll as a catch-all for many descriptive and colorful words. I’m sure you can think of a few. I know I did. Feel free to replace jerk with whatever term comes to mind. 
In my opinion, the internet hasn’t created as many jerks as it’s just uncovered them and given them a place to be seen, especially in recent years.
There have always been trolls, certainly before the internet and probably before civilization itself. There was probably some caveman who pointed a finger and yelled, “Zug zug!”1 when his hunting buddy tripped over a rock and impaled himself on his spear.
That caveman lives on today in social media, email “discussions”, and webpage comments.
It’s not new. It’s nothing special. It’s just that these days, jerks have a larger playground on which to show themselves.
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More people see ’em
If it seems like there are more jerks around, one reason is that we’re exposed to more of them than ever before.
The playground that is the internet not only gives jerks a place to be jerks, but it gives them something else: an audience. A huge audience. And many trolls thrive on that. It encourages their behavior.
As that audience, we see more people being jerks than ever before. Not because there are more of them, but because we now see more of them.
For example, in the past, trolls might have been filtered out by newspaper or magazine editors. They didn’t have as much opportunity to express their jerkiness to the world. Today, everyone’s a publisher, everyone’s a critic, and anyone can post whatever they like without negative consequences, often anonymously.
There aren’t that many more jerks. We just see more of the ones who have always been around.
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Believing and spreading manure -- lies, falsehoods, and misleading implications -- makes you look bad and makes the internet a dumber place. Become more skeptical, even of things you agree with.#9419
Jerks of a feather
There’s something else that could be happening. With more jerks visible, the internet may be giving more permission by making jerkiness more socially acceptable. People see other people being trolls and getting away with it, so they start acting like trolls themselves.
In this way, rather than having created a jerk, the internet has instead exposed or magnified one that was there all along. Perhaps seeing other people acting like trolls allows one’s pre-existing inner jerk to come out.
Perhaps it’s some of both.
Don’t let the jerks get you down
I know reading comments on any contentious topic can make you start to wonder about humanity. Regardless of where they come from or how long they’ve been around, there definitely are jerks out there.
But you know what? There are awesome people, too. In fact, there are way more awesome people than there are jerks.
What I see much more often than trolls are grateful people, respectful people, and people who help one another. I see people who can disagree without acting like schoolyard bullies or my example caveman. They’re in my inbox, in my comments, on Facebook, and everywhere else, even on YouTube.
Like what I call “the bad news problem”,2 jerks get the headlines. In reality, however many there are, they’re in the minority.
They’re just louder.
Don’t feed the jerks
I probably don’t have to tell you not to be a troll and to treat everyone with respect. You already know that behind every comment, post, and question is a real, live human being with problems, struggles, and issues, just like you and me.
They deserve our respect.
But it is important to remember what not to do when you encounter a jerk. Don’t be a troll in response. That’ll only encourage ’em.
Don’t feed the jerk.
I go one of two ways, and I recommend you do the same.
- I ignore the vast majority. As I own a platform on which they sometimes appear, I make them go away (deleting comments, blocking, and whatever other tools are available) with little regret.
- Sometimes, as with our Facebook friend above, I call them on it, hopefully in a way that may remind them there’s a real, live human being to whom they’re “speaking”. Sometimes I try to be funny (and then screenshot my response for the entertainment of my real audience).
Sometimes a reminder is all they need.
And sometimes, it’s we who need the reminder: while there may be trolls out there, there’s way more awesomeness. Just keep your eyes open and watch for it.
Do this
To quote what’s become Wheaton’s Law, “Don’t be a dick.”3
And as much as you can, ignore those who are.
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Footnotes & References
1: Theoretical caveman lingo for “Ha ha!”
2: People believe the world is much worse than it is because all they see are headlines and news reports. By definition, to be a headline or newsworthy, something must be exceptional or out of the ordinary. That means all of the good, ordinary, day-to-day things that make our world wonderful aren’t newsworthy. I started Not All News Is Bad to remind myself of this daily.
3: A synonym for jerk, of course.
Leo, the forums on Arcamax got so bad, that Arcamax dropped Disqus and now uses Facebook. The fact that now real names are used caused many to stop posting altogether. Exposure can work wonders, and in this case, the forums are almost abandoned.
Leo, you wrote:
“Don’t feed the jerks.”
On Usenet, from waaaay back in the late 70’s to early 80’s, the equivalent saying was, “Don’t feed the trolls.” Good as that advice was, it wasn’t always accepted, and many an entertaining flame war resulted (from which I often derived much laughter and bemused head-shaking).
You also wrote (in reconstruction):
“There was probably some caveman who pointed a finger and yelled, ‘Zug zug!’ (theoretical caveman lingo for ‘Ha ha!’) when his hunting buddy tripped over a rock and impaled himself on his spear.”
Here, I fear, we must part company. The phenomenon you describe has a name. It’s called “schadenfreude,” which means “enjoyment obtained from the troubles of others” (Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary, electronic edition). It is not always an intentional or even desired response; it often arises in a form more like a reflex response than anything else — as I myself, in certain past instances, can very ruefully attest. In spite of which, in my sincere (and, I hope, despite inherent bias, both humble and accurate) judgement, I declare myself most decidedly not a jerk.
Troll is still the standard Internet name for jerks who post. Jerk, in this case, is a little more generic.
I’d like to chime in on the side of a good guy. I’ve gained a lot of useful and just plain interesting information from Leo. He helped me figure out a couple of very knotty problems as well. He also seems to be a genuinely nice fellow. Thanks Leo! Keep up the good work, and we’ll all keep reading.
Thank you for your kind words!
Once again, a well-written article!
While reading what you had to say, it reminded me of an incident a couple of months ago, when I asked a question on WordPress.com (with which I have a blog site) and, was researching information, as to what I could do to make my website even better). I noticed that whomever that wrote articles for WordPress.com, had drifted off the subject and, much to my surprise, they had switched from discussing a WordPress.com Website to a WordPress.org Website (which are two different websites…one with internal hosting while the other uses external hosting). I questioned this article on the WordPress Forum, as to why this occurred and, was there a way that it could be corrected, so as those of us the had a WordPress.com or were new to WordPress.com, could get all the information that we needed to successfully run our site. (NOTE: One of the areas in question, was “Plugins”, which can only be used with a WordPress.org Website and NOT a WordPress.com Website.) When I queried as to how this could be corrected, I was told by someone within WordPress that they couldn’t correct everything and what I was reading would remain…which to me means that no one really cares for those that decide to create their own WordPress.com Website, when they should have signed up for a WordPress.org Website.)
So yes, to me there are some real jerks out on the internet.
It not possible to correct everything on a platform like WordPress. They don’t have the personnel or the money to hire the personnel to stay on top of every post.
I’m not at all surprised at the number of jerks/trolls. I saw the same thing when I was driving eighteen wheelers cross country with CB radios. There used to be a FCC requirement to obtain a license to use a CB. Then, sometime in the 80’s, that requirement was rescinded. When a license was required, it was mandatory to broadcast your call letters periodically, which identified who you were.
After the change to not needing a license, using a CB radio for its intended purposes became nearly impossible as users would say whatever they wanted as they could be anonymous. Eventually, I stopped using a CB radio as it wasn’t worth maintaining the equipment.
I view social media the same as I did CB. People will say just about anything, hiding in anonymity and numbers, making it nearly impossible to moderate.
When I do make a post, I try to keep to the subject and I also make clear that I am who I say I am. I make the effort to keep personal attacks out of it, as I don’t personally know who is reading and the readers certainly don’t know who I am, unless I tell them.
The old meme was “On the Internet, no one knows if you are a dog.”
But everybody knows if you are a jerk.