Trolls

Why are so many OPs just dismissed as trolls by everyone?
Sometimes they are just asking a question

Why are so many OPs just dismissed as trolls by everyone?
Sometimes they are just asking a question

Some trolls are offensive and deserve to be condemned. Some just want the fun of being a troll. It depends which troll you are referring to.

Neither
The ones that are asking genuine questions looking for genuine answers, that ‘troll’ is the one I’m referring to

I can't believe I've finally met a troll using their own account.

‘I’m 15 and he’s 96!!!! WOULD IT WORK????
Or
‘I crapped myself in front of him, WILL HE STILL WANT TO HAVE SEX???!!

Either they’re ****ing idiots, or they’re trolls. Could be either to be fair, but still.

@CletusPotter
Yep, people are very quick to assume we are trolls here
Let’s hope we don’t get banned

The trolls asking serious questions but hiding behind anon, do not deserve to get reported and therefore banned. The admins need to take a moment to consider who they're actually banning.

See: https://www.thestudentroom.co.uk/faq.php?faq=tsr_cat

Some relevant sections of the Terms and Conditions:

3.2 You are prohibited from posting or transmitting to or from the Website any material:
3.2.1 that is threatening, defamatory, obscene, indecent, seditious, offensive, pornographic, abusive, liable to incite racial hatred, discriminatory, menacing, scandalous, inflammatory, in breach of confidence, in breach of privacy or which may cause annoyance or inconvenience;

6.2 You agree that you will not:
6.2.2 use the Website in such a manner as would, in the sole discretion of The Student Room Group, cause harm to the Website or other Users or otherwise interfere with the enjoyment of the Website;
6.2.3 harass, abuse, bully, threaten or defraud another User;

Relevant sections of the rules:

Treat other users with respect

Keep all your posts relevant and constructive

"Trolling" is not an acceptable excuse for violating any of those rules or terms & conditions noted above (or indeed any at all). If you can't interact with other people without "trolling" them and if your enjoyment of anything involves needing to impinge on others' enjoyment of that thing, then maybe you need to do some serious self-reflection instead.

I've moved this thread to help and announcements
In an ideal world nobody would troll at all therefore mitigating the risk a genuine thread could be interpreted as a troll. Sadly however that is not the reality we are in.
Whilst the best course of action is to report a thread for the moderation team to review, if users are seeing a pattern of similar threads where the OP either a) doesnt seem serious b) posts the same thing but doesnt seem to listen to advice they can become frustrated that their advice is going to waste. Of course when anon it's not possible to be absolutely certain two threads are linked but often people can link them together if there are a lot of similar threads being made at the time, sometimes this is coincidence and sometimes it's the same person - again why it is best to report as the community staff can see who is making the threads.
It's best to always give a user the benefit of the doubt and reply as if they are genuinely asking for help (which they probably are), if there is suspicions about a thread and it is reported then the community staff will take a look at the reports and see what action if any needs taking




Nobody has ever been banned for asking a genuine question on anonymous, that is what the function is there for

Bull****, loads of genuine trolls have been banned.

Bull****, loads of genuine trolls have been banned.

Agreed, but what if I troll someone in a manner that doesn't violate the terms and conditions, or the rules e.g. in the context of a political debate? Then would that be prohibited per se?