Question: how to deal with trolls? Can't anybody do something about them?

[marketsurfer]

You know: it's quite easy to just ignore a poster in a thread. Even if I don't agree with B1S2's posts I just ignore them when I see them. I don't outright ignore him as a person.

Really, who cares if someone is saying something to me either in my thread or another thread - control yourself and just don't respond!

For instance db, there's no gun at your head telling you to respond to every single one of Surf's posts. You guys explicitly do it to each other non-stop in any thread you both end up on. Having to implement draconian censorship features because you guys can't keep baiting each other is dumb - particularly when you have the self-control to stop responding or validating it

I would never call for DB to be banned from any of my threads. I welcome him to post there--- but i'll destroy his trading and political ideas if he dares!

This is the glue that holds this site together. I am surprised Baron is messing with what works after being opposed to it rightfully for so long.

surf

 

[dbphoenix]

particularly when you have the self-control to stop responding or validating it

And why should that self-control be necessary? It's difficult to carry on a discussion with someone while some jackass is screaming in your ear about how you're a charlatan and a snake oil salesman and a stealth vendor and you're misleading the unwary, over and over and over and over without ceasing.

Given that so many men grow older without growing up, I suggest we have a thread on How To Avoid Behaving Like A Jackass as this appears to be a completely unlearned skill.

 

[i960]

The football hater gets his ass knocked out for being a fucking disruptive idiot. Now that's the way it works in the real world, and the way it should work. Unfortunately in the online world we don't have a knockout punch available, so we must do the next best thing which is allow people in a like minded conversation to be able to completely block out trolls who's sole purpose is to disagree with the entire premise of the conversation.

I get the analogy but here's the problem: it's done silently on a forum. Nobody can see that someone else was silenced *unless* that is indicated in the thread (potentially as a meta post of some sort). I really think if we're gonna go down this road and have this kind of feature then we must have accountability of who used it such that the reader can make their own judgment call on if the thread owner's actions were warranted or not. This also makes it clear if people are forcibly censoring others.

I absolutely know people are going to use this to silence those they disagree with in their own threads as a form of power. The intent of using it to keep a thread clean and the troll factor low will probably only be used 15% of the time IMO.

 

[bone]

This is good. I am coming around to this bold idea quite smartly.

One of two things will happen with the OP of a thread:

1. The OP will delete vindictive personal attacks and value statements without hard evidence. This is good.

2. The OP will delete all dissention or alternative viewpoints with constructive, trading related ideas and thoughts alternative to your assertions. This will prove that the OP is a gaping leaking vaginal canal who never traded a thing in his life. If you can't take someone offering evidence contrary to your premise, then by God you simply cannot stomach a drawdown in the trading world and you are a fraud. I mean, ET is a walk in the park compared to suffering a trading drawdown. Grow a pair.

 

[i960]

And why should that self-control be necessary? It's difficult to carry on a discussion with someone while some jackass is screaming in your ear about how you're a charlatan and a snake oil salesman and a stealth vendor and you're misleading the unwary, over and over and over and over without ceasing.

Given that so many men grow older without growing up, I suggest we have a thread on How To Avoid Behaving Like A Jackass as this appears to be a completely unlearned skill.

That's not fair. It's easy to ignore. You see it, read it, quickly categorize as "shit I agree with" or "shit I don't agree with" and respond or not respond accordingly - basically as everyone is required to do in daily life anyway. There's no need to defend yourself if you have nothing to worry about veracity wise.

Just don't respond if you know someone is baiting you and they'll likely stop baiting you. It's not like Surf is going to amp it up and take it some other level. It's forum nonsense between long-timers and for the most part I'd say that the majority of uninterested posters just visually filter it out.

There's absolutely no reason to engage Surf in battle over every single post and quite honestly while I'm not on either person's side here I think Surf is giving you more legitimate benefit of the doubt in protecting your right to criticize him than you are by gunning for the right to remove his.

 

[dbphoenix]

This is good. I am coming around to this bold idea quite smartly.

One of two things will happen with the OP of a thread:

1. The OP will delete vindictive personal attacks and value statements without hard evidence. This is good.

2. The OP will delete all dissention or alternative viewpoints with constructive, trading related ideas and thoughts alternative to your assertions. This will prove that the OP is a gaping leaking vaginal canal who never traded a thing in his life. If you can't take someone offering evidence contrary to your premise, then by God you simply cannot stomach a drawdown in the trading world and you are a fraud. I mean, ET is a walk in the park compared to suffering a trading drawdown. Grow a pair.

And those who are blocked can start their own threads and whine about having been blocked and isn't life unfair boo hoo hoo.

And I can pretty much predict who will participate in said threads. Nice thing is, one needn't read them, electing to concentrate on his trading instead.

 

[dbphoenix]

That's not fair. It's easy to ignore. You see it, read it, quickly categorize as "shit I agree with" or "shit I don't agree with" and respond or not respond accordingly - basically as everyone is required to do in daily life anyway. There's no need to defend yourself if you have nothing to worry about veracity wise.

Just don't respond if you know someone is baiting you and they'll likely stop baiting you.

Is ten years enough?

It's easy to bypass the whole problem. Just don't be a jerk.

 

[i960]

And those who are blocked can start their own threads and whine about having been blocked and isn't life unfair boo hoo hoo.

And I can pretty much predict who will participate in said threads. Nice thing is, one needn't read them, electing to concentrate on his trading instead.

Great, but an unfortunate side-effect you're not envisioning is that the rest of us DO have to read them or atleast notice them when they come up. This is needless noise and drama that atleast if kept to a single thread I can learn to ignore the thread itself. For instance, "trouble with scribbles" comes up in the new posts tab, I can just quickly skip over it knowing that it turned into a sling-fest a while ago. Maybe I might occasionally check it out again if I'm bored. However, I don't think "anti"-threads where it's one upset side pointlessly yelling at the other who's censored them (and therefore have not only limited what they themselves see but have forced their will on others) from another thread will be helpful either.

I mean really why not just straight ignore the people you consistently disagree with? Even if others quote them and you see it, it's not as if it requires you to even emotionally register it.

Another thing: it's like what we're arguing for here is the ability to emotionally handicap ourselves in an interest area that requires the exact opposite. In fact, it could be argued that since ET is relatively more gritty than other trading sites that it's better for the traders anyway.

IMO a compromise solution whereby if enough people *dislike* a post it becomes collapsed and one must click on it to see it is the best way. It's relatively based on some notion of democratic control, will be easy enough to police for abuse, and in general keeps the trolls down. Reddit uses something similar to this (as do others). More importantly it keeps the control in the readers of the thread and not the creator of the thread.

Is ten years enough?

It's easy to bypass the whole problem. Just don't be a jerk.

You're attempting to diminish your responsibility of contributing to it here. It's not like you don't bait Surf's replies too. This is not a one-sided thing.

 

[dbphoenix]

Great, but an unfortunate side-effect you're not envisioning is that the rest of us DO have to read them or atleast notice them when they come up. This is needless noise and drama that atleast if kept to a single thread I can learn to ignore the thread itself. For instance, "trouble with scribbles" comes up in the new posts tab, I can just quickly skip over it knowing that it turned into a sling-fest a while ago. Maybe I might occasionally check it out again if I'm bored. However, I don't think "anti"-threads where it's one upset side pointlessly yelling at the other who's censored them (and therefore have not only limited what they themselves see but have forced their will on others) from another thread will be helpful either.

I mean really why not just straight ignore the people you consistently disagree with? Even if others quote them and you see it, it's not as if it requires you to even emotionally register it.

Another thing: it's like what we're arguing for here is the ability to emotionally handicap ourselves in an interest area that requires the exact opposite. In fact, it could be argued that since ET is relatively more gritty than other trading sites that it's better for the traders anyway.



You're attempting to diminish your responsibility of contributing to it here. It's not like you don't bait Surf's replies too. This is not a one-sided thing.

Rather than direct your focus outward, perhaps you ought to review your first posts to Saber's journal, which according to him were part of the reason he decided to leave.

Ignore or don't ignore. Who cares? You don't HAVE to read anything.

 

[i960]

Rather than direct your focus outward, perhaps you ought to review your first posts to Saber's journal, which according to him were part of the reason he decided to leave.

I didn't force him to leave and the comment was hardly anything hugely negative or trolling. Secondly I was responding to someone else who pointed out similar concerns. In retrospect I probably could have been slightly less snarky about it. Thirdly, *you* liked the post! Sheesh.

Ignore or don't ignore. Who cares? You don't HAVE to read anything.

Yes, which is why I don't think we have to change anything whatsoever. I do think some democratic controls in certain places like journals could be beneficial - but even then those are prone to group think and tyranny of the majority (I've seen this type of thing happen regularly on reddit at /r/investing, for instance, where group think sets in and along come the negative votes).

I think some people believe others stopped posting here regularly because of a bunch of trolls or what not but I bet that's not actually the case at all. In a small percentage of cases it probably is but in reality people just moved on for whatever reason (got out of trading, didn't feel they could contribute anymore, etc).

In truth there really isn't any good system other than allowing the end reader to make their own decisions and having the thin skinned types accept that this place is what it is. One of the great things about ET is that it IS this way.