What can be done to help prevent Internet trolling?

Hello everyone! I am curious about your opinions on preventing the acts of Internet trolling and have compiled all of my questions within a short survey. I appreciate and encourage additional comments and discussion at the end of the survey as well as within this thread. This, in turn will help me come up with my own decisions and contribute to a social psychology report.

Link: https://eSurv.org?u=Corey

Thanks for reading!

Reply 1

hilrho

15

Original post by CoreyFS

Hello everyone! I am curious about your opinions on preventing the acts of Internet trolling and have compiled all of my questions within a short survey. I appreciate and encourage additional comments and discussion at the end of the survey as well as within this thread. This, in turn will help me come up with my own decisions and contribute to a social psychology report.

Link: https://eSurv.org?u=Corey

Thanks for reading!

Why would you want to prevent it? Sometimes trolling can be good for the heart.

Reply 2

william walker

3

Original post by hilrho

Why would you want to prevent it? Sometimes trolling can be good for the heart.

Yeah sometimes wonderful things can come from trolling. :smile:

Reply 3

hilrho

15

Original post by william walker

Yeah sometimes wonderful things can come from trolling. :smile:

Like us

Reply 4

vis break

3

rah the more u try and stop it the worse its gunna get fam

Reply 5

RainbowKiwi

16

You need to build a bridge.

Reply 6

kristen2

12

I'm not too sure, maybe the police naming and shaming a few once in a while?

Reply 7

AH127

12

I think the very idea of the internet as well as both the privacy and anonymity it allows means that trolling on the internet will always be a thing, and I'd rather it be as it is now than sacrifice privacy just to stop some people on the internet from saying 'mean' things.

people actually being nice on the internet would stop trolling :moon:

unfortunatley you will always get the few that aren't nice :frown:

(edited 8 years ago)

Reply 9

vis break

3

Original post by CoolCavy

people actually being nice on the internet would stop trolling :moon:

unfortunatley you will always get the few that aren't nice :frown:

fried guinea pigs would stop trolling

Reply 10

somemightsay888

20

Original post by vis break

fried guinea pigs would stop trolling

sheiiit

Reply 11

Plagioclase

21

It's just thoughtlessness and immaturity in the end, it's a big shame that some people haven't been brought up to realise or care that actions have consequences, even if you're hiding behind the safety of your keyboard. I am very glad that TSR went public about them referring that recent abuse instance to the police, I hope that might remind some people to think about what they're doing.

Original post by AH127

I think the very idea of the internet as well as both the privacy and anonymity it allows means that trolling on the internet will always be a thing, and I'd rather it be as it is now than sacrifice privacy just to stop some people on the internet from saying 'mean' things.

That's very easy to say if you've never actually been at the receiving end of these "sacrifices" you call necessary. Necessary, as long as I don't have to deal with it!

(edited 8 years ago)

Reply 12

vis break

3

Original post by somemightsay888

sheiiit

I need to stop sending, im not the post man :s

Reply 13

Sweet n Sour

3

Original post by william walker

Yeah sometimes wonderful things can come from trolling. :smile:

Original post by hilrho

Like us

*gag*

Reply 14

AH127

12

Original post by Plagioclase

-snip-

That's very easy to say if you've never actually been at the receiving end of these "sacrifices" you call necessary. Necessary, as long as I don't have to deal with it!

I disagree, it's easier to say that because I've been on the receiving end of 'trolling' both on the internet and in real life. It's far easier to deal with on the internet. There are block and report functions on many websites and online in general, and practically everything you post on the internet can be retrieved. It's also a lot easier on the web to simply not post in places without any kind of moderating going on.

I believe it's up to the individual websites to set up rules and enforce them, not the government. Besides, if some immature moron on the internet throwing poorly put together insults at a person makes that person seriously upset, the internet, and human interaction as a whole, might not be the place for them.

I don't agree with trolling, and I certainly don't like it, but my comment was that I'd much rather have some trolling than a complete lack of freedom on the web.

Just a note: I draw a line between 'trolling' and actual legitimate abuse via the internet. One is immature and mainly out of boredom, one is malicious and harmful. When it comes to defining what is harmful or not though, it's a very grey area.

For example, someone in the comments of a Youtube video posting "your dumb" would be, in my opinion, trolling. On the other hand, constantly sending hateful, degrading and personal emails to another person would be classed as abuse, and most definitely should be illegal.

Reply 15

Plagioclase

21

Original post by AH127

I disagree, it's easier to say that because I've been on the receiving end of 'trolling' both on the internet and in real life. It's far easier to deal with on the internet. There are block and report functions on many websites and online in general, and practically everything you post on the internet can be retrieved. It's also a lot easier on the web to simply not post in places without any kind of moderating going on.

I believe it's up to the individual websites to set up rules and enforce them, not the government. Besides, if some immature moron on the internet throwing poorly put together insults at a person makes that person seriously upset, the internet, and human interaction as a whole, might not be the place for them.

I don't agree with trolling, and I certainly don't like it, but my comment was that I'd much rather have some trolling than a complete lack of freedom on the web.

Just a note: I draw a line between 'trolling' and actual legitimate abuse via the internet. One is immature and mainly out of boredom, one is malicious and harmful. When it comes to defining what is harmful or not though, it's a very grey area.

For example, someone in the comments of a Youtube video posting "your dumb" would be, in my opinion, trolling. On the other hand, constantly sending hateful, degrading and personal emails to another person would be classed as abuse, and most definitely should be illegal.

I think we're talking about different things. Whilst you're talking about the original use of the word "trolling" (i.e. 14 year olds making dumb comments that they think are hilarious or people saying provocative things to wind people up), the OP has defined trolling as malicious and harmful in their survey, which is indeed what the term "trolling" has evolved to mean. When you hear trolling being talked about in the media, they're not discussing immature YouTube comments, they're discussing serious harassment - I also take issue with this being called "trolling" because that's not what it originally meant but that's the general usage now.

So I think we both agree that the problem of trolling as actual harassment is a genuine issue that needs to be taken seriously. Of course we shouldn't start arresting people because they made a few dumb comments, I don't think any sane person would argue that! However, I do see a lot of people who think that more serious internet harassment is just a necessary consequence of freedom of speech and generally speaking those people don't seem to have any kind of experience of harassment themselves.

(edited 8 years ago)

Reply 16

AH127

12

Original post by Plagioclase

-snip-

My apologies, I opened the survey in a new tab, left the keyboard for a short while and simply scrolled through the thread, forgetting to complete the survey before doing so.

Reply 17

hilrho

15

Original post by Sweet n Sour

*gag*

hahahahaha

Reply 18

CoreyFS

OP

Original post by Plagioclase

I think we're talking about different things. Whilst you're talking about the original use of the word "trolling" (i.e. 14 year olds making dumb comments that they think are hilarious or people saying provocative things to wind people up), the OP has defined trolling as malicious and harmful in their survey, which is indeed what the term "trolling" has evolved to mean. When you hear trolling being talked about in the media, they're not discussing immature YouTube comments, they're discussing serious harassment - I also take issue with this being called "trolling" because that's not what it originally meant but that's the general usage now.

Unfortunately, there are numerous definitions of the Internet troll, one is:
A person whose sole purpose in life is to seek out people to argue with on the internet over extremely trivial issues.

According to such a definition, users of a debating site could be interpreted as 'trolls', whose primary interest is to argue with others over generally trivial issues. Yet, in such a context this behavior is considered acceptable.

Regardless, I chose the definition:
Internet trolling is the act of deliberately making offensive, provocative, or off-topic online comments.

In this case, both 14 year olds and 40 years making provocative comments is trolling and this is considered unacceptable behavior to a typical context. This also includes immature YouTube comments that are intended to provoke the reader. However, this depends on the context again, for example, if the person was commenting on the video alone this would be considered acceptable - within Youtube's guidelines. Comparable to a person making an offensive comment on an online product, as they would say, they have the right to 'freedom of speech' - within reason.